This volume is a product of the efforts of the Institute for National Strategic 

Studies Spacepower Theory Project Team, which was tasked by the 

Department of Defense to create a theoretical framework for examining 

spacepower and its relationship to the achievement of national objectives. 

The team was charged with considering the space domain in a broad and 

holistic way, incorporating a wide range of perspectives from U.S. and 

international space actors engaged in scientific, commercial, intelligence, 

and military enterprises. 

This collection of papers commissioned by the team serves as a starting 

point for continued discourse on ways to extend, modify, refine, and 

integrate a broad range of viewpoints about human-initiated space 

activity, its relationship to our globalized society, and its economic, political, 

and security interactions. It will equip practitioners, scholars, students, 

and citizens with the historical background and conceptual framework 

to navigate through and assess the challenges and opportunities of an 

increasingly complex space environment.

Edited by Charles D. Lutes and Peter L. Hays with Vincent A. Manzo, Lisa 

M. Yambrick, and M. Elaine Bunn, with contributions from:

Henry F. Cooper, Jr.

Everett C. Dolman

Martin E.B. France

Colin S. Gray

Henry R. Hertzfeld

Theresa Hitchens

Michael Katz-Hyman

Michael Krepon

Benjamin S. Lambeth

Roger D. Launius

John M. Logsdon

Michael E. O’Hanlon

Scott Pace

Robert L. Pfaltzgraff, Jr.

Jerry Jon Sellers

John B. Sheldon

Harold R. Winton

Simon P. Worden
xi

Acknowledgments

The editors thank all of the authors who contributed their time, 

insights, and energy to completing the papers that form this volume.

The editors also express their deep appreciation to their fellow members of the Spacepower Theory Project—Colonel Michael S. Bell, USA; 

Colonel M.V. Smith, USAF; Lieutenant Colonel Robert Klingseisen, USA; 

and Mr. Will Lahneman, formerly of the Institute for National Strategic 

Studies (INSS) at the National Defense University (NDU)—for their dedicated work in conducting this multifaceted effort. The spacepower team 

did an exceptionally fine job in reaching out to diverse communities of 

experts in all aspects of space activity.

The editors also thank key offices in the Department of Defense for 

their steadfast support and insights. We are particularly grateful to Mr. 

Thomas G. Behling, former Deputy Undersecretary of Defense for Intelligence (Preparation and Warning); Mr. Ryan Henry, former Principal 

Deputy Undersecretary of Defense for Policy; Major General James B. 

Armor, USAF (Ret.), former Director of the National Security Space 

Office; Mr. Joseph Rouge, current Director of the National Security Space 

Office; and all their staffs. We benefited greatly from our close collaboration with the Eisenhower Center for Space and Defense Studies at the U.S. 

Air Force Academy and its director, Ambassador Roger Harrison. Indeed, 

a multitude of individuals, too numerous to mention here, contributed 

essays, presentations, dialogue, and intellectual insights in support of this 

effort, and we are most grateful for their assistance.

At NDU, special thanks are due to former NDU President, Lieutenant General Frances C. Wilson, USMC (Ret.), and current President, 

Vice Admiral Ann E. Rondeau, USN, for their unstinting support. We 

thank current and former INSS colleagues Dr. Phillip C. Saunders, 

Colonel Michael P. Hughes, USAF, Mr. Joseph McMillan, Dr. Eugene B. 

Rumer, Captain Mark E. Redden, USN, and Dr. James A. Schear. We 

also thank former INSS directors Dr. Stephen J. Flanagan and Dr. Patrick M. Cronin, former interim director Dr. Christopher J. Lamb, and 

current director Dr. Hans Binnendijk. We are indebted to the INSS 
xii TOWARD A THEORY OF SPACEPOWER

Center for Strategic Conferencing, specifically Mr. Gerald Faber and 

Mr. Edwin Roman, for hosting a number of workshops and conferences. NDU Press has provided invaluable support in editing and publishing our products. We specifically thank its former director, Colonel 

David H. Gurney, USMC (Ret.), and its current acting director, Dr. 

Thomas F. Lynch III, and his staff, including Mr. George Maerz. Finally, 

our work was ably assisted by a number of interns, especially Bradley 

Miller, Jennifer Roark, and Melissa Latham.
Chapter 1:

Old Thoughts, New Problems: Mahan and the Consideration of Spacepower

Jon Sumida

Over a century ago, the rapid expansion of global overseas trade brought about by the 

advent of improved steam propulsion and advances in ship design and construction posed 

new national policy and security questions for the United States. First, to what degree did 

American economic prosperity depend upon being a major active participant in maritime 

commerce? Second, what were the naval implications of such action with respect to the 

extension and defense of important, if not vital, American interests? Third, what role 

should the U.S. Government play in the promotion of maritime commercial activity and 

the creation of the naval forces required to protect American overseas trade? And fourth, 

what changes, if any, were required with respect to the direction of American foreign 

policy? In 1890, Captain Alfred Thayer Mahan, a serving officer in the U.S. Navy, 

published The Influence of Sea Power upon History, 1660–1783. This book provided a 

comprehensive statement about maritime commerce, naval power, government policy, 

and international politics that became the theoretical point of departure for almost all 

discussion of what was widely regarded to be the most important national security 

problem of the day, both in the United States and around the world.

Today, the importance of space as a venue for economic and military activity in certain 

respects resembles the conditions of maritime commerce and naval power in the late 19th

century. These circumstances prompt two questions: first, is a history-based exploration 

of prospects and possibilities of spacepower, in the manner of Mahan, a viable 

intellectual proposition? Second, does his work contain ideas that are applicable to 

spacepower or at least suggest potentially productive lines of inquiry? Addressing these 

issues, however, requires a sound foundation—namely, an accurate understanding of 

Mahan's major arguments and his manner of reasoning. Unfortunately, misunderstanding 

Mahan is the rule rather than the exception. His writing is rarely read, and the bulk of the 

critical literature is corrupted by serious interpretive error. What follows is a schematic 

representation of Mahanian argument that can be related to the consideration of the 

nature of the theoretical problem of spacepower.1

Alfred Thayer Mahan's The Influence of Sea Power upon History, 1660–1783 is widely 

regarded as the first important study of the relationship between naval affairs and 

international politics. Mahan subsequently published more than 20 additional volumes 

that extended and elaborated upon the views presented in this book. Inclusion in this 

book of a chapter based upon the traditional summary of Mahan's main ideas could be 

justified as an obligatory nod to tradition or an act of faith in the capacity of patristic 

writing to inspire strategic insight. Recent scholarship, however, has demonstrated that 

Mahan's thinking about seapower has been fundamentally misunderstood. This chapter 

will thus examine three areas where the new interpretation of Mahan affects 
consideration of problems that are of interest today. The first is naval and military 

cooperation when fighting in inland or coastal waters. The second is the nature and role 

of naval supremacy with respect to a complex world system of trade. The third is the 

requirements of naval higher education in a period of rapid technological change. In other 

words, Mahan's work will be related to jointness and power projection, the expansion of 

the global economy, and the cognitive qualities necessary to fully grasp the process of 

radical changes in major weaponry and their use known as transformation.

There are three main arguments. First, Mahan believed that when one side in a conflict 

possessed absolute sea command or, in special cases, even temporary local control, naval 

operations in direct support of land forces could be of decisive importance. Second, 

Mahan maintained that naval supremacy in the 20th century would be exercised by a 

transnational consortium acting in defense of a multinational system of free trade. 

Finally, Mahan was convinced that the sweeping improvement of naval materiel by 

radical technological change had not eliminated tactical and strategic uncertainty from 

the conduct of war, and that the enhancement of executive ability through the rigorous 

study of history should therefore be the basis of naval officer education. Mahan is often 

portrayed as a purveyor of truisms about naval strategy and doctrine based upon 

misreadings of fragments of his writing or, all too often, upon no reading of the original 

texts at all. The resulting caricature is frequently either misapplied or dismissed as 

outdated. This chapter, which is informed by the study of all of Mahan's major 

publications and surviving correspondence, intends to demonstrate that there is good 

reason to recall the adage, "When you want a good new idea, read an old book."

Complex Interrelated Dynamics

Alfred Thayer Mahan was an officer in the Union Navy during the Civil War. Although 

never a participant in a major battle, his Active service included many months of inshore 

work in small warships enforcing the blockade of the Confederate coast. Nearly two 

decades after the end of hostilities, Mahan accepted a commission to write a book about 

naval operations on the Caribbean coast and up the Mississippi and Red Rivers in the 

War Between the States. In addition to being able to draw upon his own experience 

during this conflict, Mahan studied memoirs and documents and corresponded with 

veterans from both sides. The completed work, which was entitled The Gulf and Inland 

Waters, was published in 1883. Several years after the appearance of The Influence of Sea 

Power upon History and its two-volume sequel, The Influence of Sea Power upon the 

French Revolution and Empire, which came out in 1892, Mahan produced a biography of 

the admiral who commanded most of the Union operations described in his first book. 

Admiral Farragut, published in 1897, gave Mahan another opportunity to present his 

views on fighting in littoral and interior waters that involved cooperation between the 

Army and Navy.

During the Civil War, the lack of a fleet meant that the Confederacy could not mount an 

effective challenge to Union control of the high seas. Moreover, the naval weakness of 

the Southern States exposed their vital internal riverine communications and major ports 

to seaborne assault. Over the course of the 4-year conflict, the territorial integrity and 
economic vitality of the South were compromised by the integrated action of the Union 

Army and Navy, which established Northern control of the Mississippi and captured New 

Orleans and Mobile. Mahan's two accounts of these campaigns demonstrate that he 

possessed considerable knowledge of the special characteristics of brown-water fighting, 

appreciated the necessity of connecting the activity of land and naval forces, and 

recognized that the success of joint operations had been a major contributor to the 

ultimate Union victory. In books written before and after the Farragut biography, Mahan 

criticized Nelson's advocacy of amphibious operations in support of land campaigns and 

in general opposed overseas expeditions. But these views were applied to circumstances 

in which the opposing side possessed—or was supposed to possess—the capacity to 

dispute sea command. Mahan thus reasoned that any attempt to project power from water 

to land risked naval assets that were needed to preserve the general control of the oceans 

upon which all depended. When the maintenance of maritime lines of communication 

was not an issue, he had no objection to using naval force in combination with an army to 

achieve a military objective and understood that such action could have great strategic 

value.

Indeed, Mahan attributed his initial inspiration for the idea that naval supremacy was of 

much larger historical significance than was generally recognized to his reflections on a 

historical case involving the use of uncontested command of the sea to achieve decisive 

military success. In his memoirs, he recalled that in 1885, he had chanced upon Theodor 

Mommsen's history of ancient Rome. While reading this book, Mahan was struck by the 

thought that the outcome of the wars between Rome and Carthage would have been 

different had the latter possessed the ability, as did the former, of using the sea as an 

avenue of invasion, instead of moving its armies over land. After some reflection, Mahan 

decided to apply the example of the victory of a state that could use naval force 

effectively over one that could not to the history of European wars in the late 17th and 18th

centuries. This resulted in the first of the "influence of sea power" volumes in which 

Mahan closed the introduction with a lengthy examination of the naval aspects of Rome's 

defeat of Carthage. He ended the main narrative of The Influence of Sea Power upon 

History with an account of the British defeat at Yorktown in 1781. The outcome of this 

battle was determined by the reinforcement of American and French armies by sea and 

French naval control of surrounding waters, which prevented a British fleet from 

relieving the besieged British army. The Yorktown disaster prompted negotiations that 

ultimately ended the war and established American independence. In the book that made 

his reputation, Mahan thus used the survival of what was to become imperial Rome and 

the creation of the United States as powerful historical testaments to the transcendent 

value of using naval force in support of military operations.

But The Influence of Sea Power upon History also introduced a set of propositions about 

the relationship between the economic basis of national strength and the development and 

effective use of a navy. Seaborne trade, Mahan maintained in his first bestseller, was a 

critically important generator of wealth. In the event of war, a nation that could protect its 

own maritime commerce while disrupting that of its opponent could shift the balance of 

national resources decisively in its favor. A fleet capable of winning and keeping 

command of the sea was required to accomplish both of these tasks. In peace, a great 
state was thus well advised to do everything it could to build the strongest possible navy. 

Over time, the cumulative effect of sound naval policy and strategy in peace and war was 

economic prosperity and territorial aggrandizement. Naval force structure and 

deployment were also important variables. Cruiser attacks on scattered shipping, Mahan 

believed, were incapable of inflicting prohibitive losses on a large merchant marine. 

Blockade of the enemy's main ports—implemented by a fleet of battleships capable of 

defeating any force that was sent against it—was the only way to accomplish the 

complete or near-complete stoppage of overseas commerce required to achieve a 

significant strategic effect against a great maritime power. For this reason, Mahan made 

the number of battleships the measure of naval potency, and the destruction of the enemy 

battle fleet through decisive engagement—for the purposes of either securing or breaking 

a blockade—the main operational objective of naval strategy.

These interrelated arguments addressed major concerns of Mahan's own time. From the 

1880s, the general expansion of European navies in response to increasing imperial 

rivalry was accompanied by intensive debate over the relative merits of a naval strategy 

based on commerce-raiding by cruisers as opposed to one based on command of the sea 

by battleships. In addition, the advent of steam propulsion and metal hulls had vastly 

increased the efficiency of maritime transport, which in turn caused a sharp upturn in 

overseas commerce and the wealth generated by this kind of activity. Mahan's choice of 

European great power conflict during the late age of sail as the vehicle for his argument 

also favored discussion of the general struggle for naval supremacy over case studies of 

combined operations along coasts and rivers. So although Mahan clearly recognized the 

importance of power projection from sea to land, it was his examination of the contest for 

command of the sea and its political-economic consequences that created the immediate 

wide audience for The Influence of Sea Power upon History and later publications. The 

resulting association of Mahan with arguments about naval supremacy exclusively 

distorted perception of his identity as a strategic theorist, setting the stage for misleading 

comparisons with writers who focused more attention on the relationship of land and 

seapower, such as C.E. Callwell and Julian Corbett. But a far greater problem was created 

by the serious misunderstanding of the basic character of Mahan's rendition of European 

naval history in the age of sail, which led to the drawing of faulty inferences about 

Mahan's fundamental views on grand strategy. 

The "influence of sea power" series began in the mid-17th century with a situation in 

which three major maritime states—France, the Netherlands, and England—were roughly 

balanced with respect to naval prowess and accomplishment. It ended in the early 19th

century with the wars of the French Revolution and Empire, during which Britain's Royal 

Navy more or less ruled the waves. In addition to the two works named previously, which 

provided an overview of the entire period, there were two supporting case studies: a 

biography of Admiral Horatio Nelson and an account of the War of 1812. In terms of 

plot, the entire series could be read as the story of the rise of Britain's naval supremacy 

and its consequent achievement of economic and political preeminence in Europe. In 

terms of moral, the series seemed to say that Britain's sustained, aggressive use of a large 

fleet to obtain territory, wealth, and power could be emulated by any state that had the 

mind and will to follow the British example. Mahan, many believed, had produced an 
analytical history that was intended as a grand strategic primer for his own times, and in 

particular for the government of his own country. He was indeed a proponent of a muchstrengthened U.S. Navy. It was thus not hard to imagine that he hoped that his homeland 

would become the world's greatest power in the 20th century by the same means that 

Britain had used to achieve this status in the period covered by his histories. And the fact 

that the United States ultimately rose to the top in large part through the effective use of 

naval supremacy only reinforced the propensity to draw inferences such as these about 

Mahan's underlying motive. 

Careful consideration of Mahan's actual writing in the "influence of sea power" series, his 

political-economic outlook, and his punditry about the future course of world politics, 

however, makes it impossible to accept the foregoing characterizations of his account of 

naval warfare in the late age of sail and their intended application to the 20th century. The 

first installment of the series is about the failure of France to exploit its maritime assets 

properly, which, in Mahan's view, allowed Britain to achieve major successes in war 

virtually by default. Mahan chose to close the book with a disproportionately lengthy 

account of the American Revolution, a conflict in which sound French policy and 

deployments resulted in Britain's defeat and the loss of a vast and rich colonial territory. 

In the wars of the French Revolution and Empire, the navy of France was compromised 

from the start by political upheaval and institutional disintegration. The second 

installment was thus about Britain's use of naval supremacy to contain a militarily 

preeminent France through a strategy of attrition. Mahan did not hold that the ultimate 

outcome was preordained—that is, naval supremacy as such guaranteed victory. Given 

the evenness of the balance between the opposing sides, he argued in both the second and 

the third installments, the triumph of Britain depended upon extraordinary operational 

naval leadership in the person of Nelson. In the concluding installment, Mahan's main 

theme was that inadequate American naval strength was the fundamental explanation of 

diplomatic failure before the War of 1812, and naval operational impotence, with all its 

attendant serious strategic drawbacks, during the conflict.

Britain and its naval strategy did not, in short, represent the focus of the "influence of sea 

power" series. Mahan's histories did not comprise a simple morality play about a single 

state acting according to a prescribed general course of action but rather provided a 

complex picture of the interrelated dynamics of naval and maritime commercial activity 

on the one hand, and international politics on the other. Mahan's essentially liberal 

political-economic views, moreover, meant that he rejected the mercantilist conception of 

a world consisting of competing players with mutually exclusive interests. Mahan 

believed that free trade between nations promoted increases in the volume of 

international exchanges of goods that worked to the benefit of all participants. The great 

expansion of French overseas shipping after the War of the Spanish Succession, he 

argued in the first installment of the series, was attributable to peace and the removal of 

restrictions on commerce, not government initiatives. In the second installment, Mahan 

observed that seapower was an organism that included not only organized naval force but 

also free maritime enterprise. While the former depended upon state funding and 

direction, the latter thrived in the absence of government interference. During the wars of 

the French Revolution and Empire, Mahan maintained, the British state was able to 
exploit the prosperity produced by an international sea-based mercantile system that it 

could protect but did not possess. It was not, in other words, the owner of seapower, but 

rather its custodian.

Mahan believed that Britain had been both the defender and main beneficiary of seaborne 

trade in the late 18th and early 19th centuries because Parliament had been dominated by a 

small group of men with close ties to maritime commerce. Such an oligarchy was 

predisposed to favor heavy spending on the navy, which produced a fleet strong enough 

to defend a merchant marine that carried a large proportion of the world's overseas trade. 

Over the course of the 19th century, however, the democratization of the British political 

system undercut the manipulation of government policy by a mercantile elite. As a 

consequence, Mahan argued, the British state of the late 19th and 20th centuries had lost 

the will to finance a navy capable of defending what had become a much larger and 

increasingly multinational system of oceanic economic exchange. Moreover, in Mahan's 

view, no single democratized power could be capable of assuming such a burden. For this 

reason—and the fact that he was convinced that free trade conditions provided large 

benefits to all major maritime countries—Mahan concluded that in the 20th century, naval 

supremacy would be exercised by a transnational consortium of navies. The basis of such 

a system, he insisted, would not be formal agreement, but the absence of important 

conflicts of political interest coupled to a common stake in the security of a highly 

productive form of economic activity. Mahan was thus convinced that Britain and the 

United States would cooperate without recourse to a treaty, and that in such a relationship 

the latter would serve as the junior partner. To play even this supporting role effectively, 

Mahan insisted America needed a larger navy. He did not advocate the creation of an 

American Navy that was stronger than every other unless the British navy was weakened 

by inadequate financing or war with a competing European enemy.

Mahan offered his views on the future course of international affairs in articles written for 

periodicals that were later collected and published as books, and in several occasional 

book-length monographs. Mahan contemplated a range of possible courses of events. 

These included the containment of an expansionist Russia by an international coalition, 

war between Britain and Germany, and even a cataclysmic collision between European 

and Asian civilizations. What he did not do was apply a crude reading of the great power 

contests of the late age of sail to the industrial future by imagining the rise of a 

hegemonic United States through offensive naval war and mercantilist economic policy. 

And while his realist temperament prompted him to argue that war and the threat of war 

would be likely facts of life for the foreseeable future, Mahan did not rule out either the 

possibility or desirability of general peace founded upon the workings of an international 

system of free trade. In such a world economy, he was confident that the energy and 

entrepreneurial spirit of the American people would enable them to compete successfully.

In the second half of the 19th century, the onset of industrialization transformed naval 

materiel within the span of a generation. When Mahan was a midshipman at the United 

States Naval Academy just before the American Civil War, he was trained on wooden 

sailing ships armed with muzzle-loading guns. By the time he retired from the Service at 

the end of the century, steel warships propelled by steam and equipped with breech-
loading guns of much larger size and power were standard. The sudden obsolescence of 

much of what had constituted traditional naval fighting practice as a result of rapid 

technical change, and the virtually worldwide sense that what really mattered in war was 

the possession of the latest and therefore most capable naval armaments, undermined the 

self-confidence of naval executive officers. Conversely, naval officer technicians could 

celebrate the wonders of technical improvement and claim that the critical importance of 

qualitative advantage in materiel had made their activity central to the efficiency of the 

Navy. Moreover, administrative burdens were magnified by the needs of managing the 

new technology and also the expansion of the American fleet that began in the 1880s, 

which created a large class of naval officer bureaucrats with pretensions to higher status 

that were not directly connected to executive command at sea. 

These developments alarmed Mahan. By dint of intellectual patrimony and personal 

experience in the greatest conflict ever fought by his Service up to his time, he had 

decided opinions on the paramount value of effective leadership in war and how it might 

be developed. Mahan's father, Dennis Hart Mahan, a distinguished professor at the 

United States Military Academy at West Point, believed that great executive leadership 

was of crucial importance in war. The elder Mahan observed that at critical junctures, a 

commander would be confronted with complex, contingent, changing, and contradictory 

information, which meant that decisionmaking could never be reduced to the mechanistic 

application of rules or principles. The development of the kind of temperament required 

to facilitate sound judgment under such circumstances, he was convinced, could be 

encouraged by the study of detailed and analytically rigorous operational history. There 

can be little doubt that this outlook was imparted to his son, in whom it was later 

reinforced by the younger Mahan's direct observation of command decisionmaking in the 

Civil War. Alfred Thayer Mahan's first publication of 1879 was an essay on naval 

education, in which he attacked what he regarded as the overemphasis of technical 

subjects and called for much greater attention to the study of what amounted to the liberal 

arts. Such an approach, he maintained, would develop the moral qualities that officers 

required to be able to make decisions in the face of danger and uncertainty. The vital role 

of moral strength with respect to executive command and the appropriate means of 

improving it in naval officers became a theme in Mahan's later writing that was no less 

important to him than his examination of the relationship between naval affairs and 

international politics.

In The Influence of Sea Power upon History, Mahan argued that while tactics changed as 

the character of armaments changed, the validity of the basic principles of strategy was 

relatively unaffected by technical progress, and human character was an absolute 

constant. History, therefore, might have little to say that was of current applicability to 

tactics but a great deal that was pertinent to strategy and operational command. Mahan 

devoted as much attention in the main narrative of this work to the strategic direction of 

naval operations as he did to his grand strategic argument about the relationship between 

naval supremacy and the course of international politics. He also made a few 

observations about the critical effect of individual moral character on the exercise of 

naval command. In later installments of the "influence of sea power" series, he remained 
no less attentive to strategic questions and, through his treatment of Nelson's leadership 

qualities, wrote at length about the moral dimensions of executive decisionmaking in war. 

In several of his articles, Mahan maintained that the essence of effective command was 

rapid and judicious risktaking while bearing the burden of full responsibility for the 

outcome of action. This set of characteristics was alien to the scientific mentalité of the 

engineer, which dealt deliberately with the discovery of certainty about physical matters 

through controlled experiment, and the bureaucratized mindset of the administrator, 

which countenanced delay and fragmented accountability. In peace, an executive leader 

had few if any opportunities either to display his capacity for war command or acquire 

experience that would enable him to develop it, while technicians and bureaucrats 

flourished in the pursuit of engineering innovation or administrative expansion. For 

Mahan, therefore, serious naval history of the kind that he had produced in the "influence 

of sea power" series served two major practical functions. First, it reminded the Navy of 

what executive war command was and why it was important. And second, it provided a 

sound educational basis for developing it in officers who had no war experience. The 

latter task was accomplished through the telling of stories about naval decisionmaking in 

war that prompted readers to imagine the psychological dynamics as well as material 

circumstances that conditioned the direction of operations in a real conflict.

Mahan lacked the powers of technical ratiocination that were needed to evaluate properly 

a complex engineering problem such as capital ship design. His criticisms of the all-biggun battleship in the early 20th century, therefore, failed to take into account several 

significant factors, which exposed his analysis to swift and thorough destruction. But 

Mahan was not a naval technological Luddite. If he was a critic of many of the claims 

made for mechanical innovation, it was because he was convinced that such progress had 

not eliminated uncertainty from decisionmaking in war and that the decadence of the 

naval executive ethos was thus a dangerous weakness. His antidote to the technological 

determinists of his time was history rather than political science. This was because he 

believed that the verisimilitude that accompanied detailed narrative about things that had 

actually happened could engage the minds and feelings of students of command in ways 

that a summary statement of lessons or abstractions could not. Mahan's preference for 

historical representation over the construction of explanatory systems when dealing with 

the past is in line with much that has been argued by proponents of chaos and complexity 

theory. And his recommended remedy to moral dilemma—confidence in intelligent 

intuition—is one that is supported by the findings of cognitive science. Viewed in light of 

the work in these cutting-edge areas of inquiry into the natures of human learning and 

behavior, the writings of Mahan may be regarded as not just relevant, but revelatory.

A Cognitive Point of Departure

For nearly 100 years, Alfred Thayer Mahan's pronouncements on naval affairs and 

international politics were too famous to be ignored but were also too extensive, difficult, 

and complicated to be easily understood as a whole. From the start, most writers on naval 

history and strategy misperceived his work, and successive generations compounded the 

errors of their predecessors, which created a large literature whose shortcomings further 
obstructed access to the meaning of the original texts. As a consequence, Mahan's basic 

ideas have been misrepresented as follows. First, sea control was always the central 

question of naval strategy. Second, the ideal of national grand strategy was the 

achievement of naval supremacy as the prerequisite to international economic and 

political preeminence. And third, success in naval warfare depended upon the correct 

application of certain principles of strategy. These propositions add little to discussions of 

current naval concerns, which consider the American possession of sea control and a 

monopoly of superpower status practically as givens and are dominated by contemplation 

of the transformation of fighting practice by radical technological innovation.

The major arguments of Mahan revealed by comprehensive and rigorous critical 

examination, however, are very different than has been supposed. Moreover, the issues 

that prompted him to put pen to paper were remarkably similar to those of today. He 

began both his naval and writing careers dealing with joint operations in coastal waters. 

Mahan was confronted by the rapid expansion of a global system of free trade and 

uncertainty about what America's proper naval role under such conditions should be. And 

his generation witnessed a "revolution in naval affairs" occasioned by the replacement of 

preindustrial with industrial naval armaments, which raised large questions about the 

nature of war command and the education of those who would exercise it. 

Mahan's contemplation of these problems produced the following conclusions. First, 

close cooperation between land and sea forces is essential for the success of joint 

operations, whose outcomes could determine the victor in a major war. Second, the cost 

of building and maintaining a navy that is unilaterally strong enough to command the 

seas is too high for any single power, and for this reason sea control in the 20th century 

and beyond would be the responsibility of a transnational consortium of navies. And 

third, great advances in technology do not diminish reliance upon the good judgment of 

naval executive leaders, who could best be prepared for high-level decisionmaking in war 

by the proper study of history. 

Identifying Mahan's basic attitudes toward power projection from sea to land, naval 

supremacy, and the relationship between technological change and officer education does 

more than correct academic error. What were believed to be Mahan's ideas created a body 

of theory—whether through acceptance, modification, or rejection—that forms an 

enduring element of the thought processes of most senior military officers and civilian 

defense professionals. Changing what has long been a cognitive point of departure, 

therefore, has significant implications for anyone concerned with the future of national 

security policy and military strategy. 

Mahan has been widely regarded as the discoverer of what he supposedly believed were 

universal truths about naval strategy that were to be applied directly. The fact is that 

Mahan's propositions were observations about particular phenomena rather than general 

lessons. When dealing with Mahan, the focus of inquiry should not, for this reason, be 

upon the statement of principle or delineation of precedent, but rather on his choice of 

issues and the complexities of the historical cases that were his main subjects. The crucial 

linkages between his past and our present, in other words, are not to be found in his 
conclusions, but in his questions and his conduct of the inquiry. These are still worth 

engaging because Mahan faced problems that were similar to those that confront states 

and their militaries today, and he did so with a powerful intelligence that was informed 

by rich experience and wide reading. History was the venue for Mahan's scholarly labors, 

because he understood both the limits of theory and the power of narrative when it came 

to matters of human behavior and social organization under the conditions of war. While 

there is much more that can and should be written about the general and particular 

aspects of armed forces and national military power, approaching—to say nothing of 

matching—the intellectual standard of Mahan's pioneering achievement will not be easy.

Applying Mahan to Space

Mahan's major concerns and his questions about them can be restated in terms of 

spacepower as follows:

• What is the economic significance of the development of space activity, and to 

what degree does future American economic performance depend upon it?

• What are the security requirements of space-based economic activity?

• What role should the U.S. Government play in the promotion of space-based 

economic activity and its defense?

• What kind of diplomatic action will be required to support space-based economic 

activity and its defense?

Mahan's writing about seapower suggests the following answers. First, activity in space 

will, in manifold ways, have large and growing economic effects, and will therefore be 

highly significant for the economic future of the United States. Second, the security 

requirements of space-based economic activity will involve costs that are beyond the 

means of any single nation-state, including the United States. Third, U.S. Government 

policy can support the economic development of space and contribute to the defense of 

such activity, but the dynamics of both will be largely determined by private capitalism 

and other nation-states with major interests in the space economy. And fourth, American 

diplomacy should encourage international economic activity in space and be directed 

toward the creation and sustenance of a multinational space security regime.

Mahan's views on education and professionalism raise the question of what kind of study 

would best serve the development of a distinctive approach to spacepower. Mahan would 

almost certainly have opposed tendencies to think of space problems in primarily 

technical or operational terms. He used the history of naval and maritime affairs in the 

age of sail to formulate productive insights about such activity in his industrial present 

and future. His contention was that analysis of the distant past had utility in spite of very 

great differences in political-economic perspective (mercantilism as opposed to free 

trade) and technology (wooden construction and sail power as opposed to steel ships and 

steam propulsion). A similar approach to spacepower would be to use the history of 

industrial navies in the 20th century as the basis of significant thought about certain 

salient aspects of spacepower. Such an expedient would in effect transpose the venue of 

historical study forward—that is to say, the history of the 20th century would serve as an 
instructive platform for the 21st as Mahan had used the history of the 18th century to guide 

the 19th. In addition, the naval subjects studied would change, emphasis being shifted 

from the examination of campaigns and wars to the consideration of technological change 

on the one hand, and patterns of change in grand strategic, strategic, operational, and 

tactical practice on the other. A great deal of attention would also have to be paid to such 

matters as the forms of transnational political, economic, and military and naval 

cooperation, and the interplay of economics, finance, legislative and executive politics, 

and bureaucratic administration with respect to the design and production of weapons. 

The writing of such a history would require use of state-of-the-art historical techniques 

and knowledge of an enormous scholarly literature and would demand imaginative 

speculation about important matters that have not yet been investigated. No such history 

exists, and bringing it into being would be an enormous undertaking.

Notes

1. An earlier version of this article was published in 2001 as "Getting New Insight from Old Books: 

The Case of Alfred Thayer Mahan," in the Naval War College Review. The article is presented 

here in its entirety, with slight modification, and is followed by a commentary on its relevance to 

the discussion of spacepower.
Chapter 2:

On the Nature of Military Theory

Harold R. Winton

The quest for a theory of spacepower is a useful enterprise. It is based on the proposition 

that before one can intelligently develop and employ spacepower, one should understand 

its essence. It is also based on the historical belief that, over the long haul, military 

practice has generally benefited from military theory.1 While such a conviction is 

generally true, this happy state has not always been realized. Faulty theory has led to 

faulty practice perhaps as often as enlightened theory has led to enlightened practice.2 

This does not necessarily call into question the utility of theory per se, but it does 

reinforce the need to get it about right. Taking the broader view, it is a trait of human 

nature to yearn for understanding of the world in which we live; and when a relatively 

new phenomenon such as spacepower appears on the scene, it is entirely natural to seek 

to comprehend it through the use of a conceptual construct. Thus, one can at least hope 

that the common defense will be better provided for by having a theory of spacepower 

than by not having one. 

This chapter will deal only tangentially with spacepower. Its main task is to explore the 

nature of theory itself. First, it examines the general and somewhat problematic 

relationship between theory and the military profession. Next, it surveys what theorists 

and academics say about the utility of theory. It then seeks to determine what utility 

theory actually has for military institutions, particularly in the articulation of military 

doctrine. Finally, it offers a few implications that may be germane to a theory of 

spacepower. 

Theory and the Military Profession 

To examine the relationship between theory and the military profession, we must first 

assess the salient characteristics of each.3 

Webster's definition of theory as "a coherent group of general propositions used as 

principles of explanation for a class of phenomena"4 is a pretty good place to start. It 

highlights the essential task of explanation and the desirable criterion of coherence. But if 

we stand back a bit, we can tease out several other functions of theory. The first two 

occur before its explanatory function. Theory's first task is to define the field of study 

under investigation, or, in Webster's words, the "class of phenomena." In visual terms, 

this defining act draws a circle and declares that everything inside the circle is 

encompassed by the theory, while everything outside it is not. In the theory of war, for 

example, Carl von Clausewitz offers two definitions. The first states baldly, "War is thus 

an act of force to compel our enemy to do our will."5 After introducing the limiting factor 

of rationality into the consideration of what war is, Clausewitz expands this definition as 
follows: "War is not a mere act of policy but a true political instrument, a continuation of 

political activity with other means."6 A synthesis of these two definitions would be that 

war is the use of force to achieve the ends of policy. Although the utility of this definition 

has been argued at some length, it leaves no doubt as to what Clausewitz's theory is 

about.7 

The next task of theory is to categorize—to break the field of study into its constituent 

parts. Here it may be helpful to visualize the subject of the theory as a spherical object 

rather than a circle. The sphere can be divided in many different ways: horizontally, 

vertically, diagonally, or, if it is a piece of citrus fruit, into sections that follow the natural 

internal segmentation. Again, reference to Clausewitz is instructive. War has two 

temporal phases—planning and conduct—and two levels—tactics and strategy—each 

with its own dynamics.8 Furthermore, wars could also be categorized according to their 

purpose (offensive or defensive) and the amount of energy (limited or total) to be devoted 

to them.9 A word about categorization is important here because it relates to the 

continuous evolution of theory. Theories tend to evolve in response to two stimuli: either 

new explanations are offered and subsequently verified that more accurately explain an 

existing reality, or the field of study itself changes, requiring either new explanations or 

new categories. An example of the former is the Copernican revolution in astronomy.10 

An example of the latter is the early 20th-century discovery of the operation, which 

emerged from the industrial revolution's influence on the conduct of war, as the 

connecting link between a battle and a campaign and subsequently led to the study of 

operational art as a new subdiscipline of military art and science.11 

The third, and by far the most important, function of theory is to explain. Webster's 

definition cited above is correct in emphasizing theory's explanatory role, for, as Nicolaus 

Copernicus, Johannes Kepler, Albert Einstein, and scores of other theorists so clearly 

demonstrated, explanation is the soul of theory. In the military sphere, Alfred Thayer 

Mahan's statement that the sea is "a wide common, over which men may pass in all 

directions, but on which some well-worn paths show that controlling reasons have led 

them to choose certain lines of travel rather than others" explains the underlying logic of 

what are today called sea lines of communication.

12 Reading further in Mahan, one finds 

an extended explanation of the factors influencing the seapower of a state.13 Explanation 

may be the product of repetitive observation and imaginative analysis, as Copernicus' 

was, or of "intuition, supported by being sympathetically in touch with experience," as 

Einstein's was.14 In either case, theory without explanatory value is like salt without 

savor—it is worthy only of the dung heap. 

But theory performs two additional functions. First, it connects the field of study to other 

related fields in the universe. This marks the great utility of Clausewitz's second 

definition of war, noted above. Although war had been used as a violent tool of political 

institutions dating to before the Peloponnesian War, Clausewitz's elegant formulation, 

which definitively connected violence with political intercourse, was perhaps his most 

important and enduring contribution to the theory of war. 
Finally, theory anticipates. The choice of this verb is deliberate. In the physical realm, 

theory predicts. Isaac Newton's theory of gravitation and Kepler's laws of planetary 

motion, combined with detailed observations of perturbations in the orbit of Uranus and 

systematic hypothesis testing, allowed Urbain Jean Joseph Le Verrier and John Couch 

Adams independently to predict the location of Neptune in 1845.15 But action and 

reaction in the human arena, and therefore in the study of war, are much less certain, and 

we must be content to live with a lesser standard. Nevertheless, anticipation can be 

almost as important as prediction. In the mid-1930s, Mikhail Tukhachevskii and a coterie 

of like-minded Soviet officers discovered that they had the technological capacity "not 

only to exercise pressure directly on the enemy's front line, but to penetrate his 

dispositions and to attack him simultaneously over the whole depth of his tactical 

layout."16 They lacked both the means and the knowledge that would allow them to 

extend this "deep battle" capability to the level of "deep operations," where the problems 

of coordination on a large scale would become infinitely more complex. But the 

underlying conceptual construct—that is, what was practically feasible on a small level 

was theoretically achievable on a much larger scale—was a powerful notion that has only 

recently been fully realized in the performance of the U.S. Armed Forces in the Gulf 

Wars of 1991 and 2003. 

But theory also has its limitations. No theory can fully replicate reality. There are simply 

too many variables in the real world for theory to contemplate them all. Thus, all theories 

are to some extent simplifications. Second, as alluded to earlier, things change. In the 

realm of military affairs, such change is uneven, varying between apparent stasis and 

virtual revolution. Nevertheless, military theory always lags behind the explanatory curve 

of contemporary developments. Thus, we can here paraphrase Michael Howard's famous 

stricture on doctrine, theory's handmaiden, and declare dogmatically that whatever 

theories exist (at least in the realm of human affairs), they are bound to be wrong—but it 

is the task of theorists to make them as little wrong as possible.

17 

This observation leads to a brief consideration of the several sources of theory. The first 

lies in the nature of the field of study about which the theory is being developed. As 

Clausewitz noted in his discussion of the theory of strategy, the ideas about the subject 

had to "logically derive from basic necessities."18 These necessities are rooted in the 

nature of the thing itself, its phenomenology. As time passes, men accumulate experience 

related to the phenomenon, and this experience contributes to the refinement and further 

development of theory. As Mahan famously noted of naval strategy, "The teachings of 

the past have a value which is in no degree lessened."19 But if theory has one foot firmly 

rooted in the empirical past, it also has the other planted in the world of concepts. In other 

words, theory draws from other relevant theory. It is no accident that Julian Corbett's 

instructive treatise Some Principles of Maritime Strategy begins with an extended 

recapitulation of On War, which might lightheartedly be characterized as "Clausewitz for 

Sailors."20 Corbett was keenly aware that the theory of war at sea, while distinct in many 

ways from the theory of war on land, had to be rooted in a general conceptual framework 

of war itself. He also knew that Clausewitz provided a solid base upon which to build. 

But Corbett's work is also emblematic of another source of theory: dissatisfaction with 

existing theory. This notion of dissatisfaction runs like a brightly colored thread 
throughout almost all of military theory. Clausewitz wrote because he was fed up with 

theories that excluded moral factors and genius from war; Corbett wrote to correct 

Mahan's infatuation with concentration of the fleet and single-minded devotion to the 

capital ship; and J.F.C. Fuller railed against what he called the alchemy of war, whose 

poverty of thought and imagination had led to the horrors of World War I.21 

To sum up, although theory is never complete and is always bound to be at least 

somewhat wrong, it performs several useful functions when it defines, categorizes, 

explains, connects, and anticipates. And it is primarily a product of the mind. There are 

good reasons that the world produces relatively few theorists worthy of the name. The 

formulation of useful theory demands intense powers of observation, ruthless intellectual 

honesty, clear thinking, mental stamina of the highest order, gifted imagination, and other 

attributes that defy easy description.22 These are not qualities normally associated with the 

military profession. 

Why is this so? First, war is an intensely practical activity and a ruthless auditor of both 

individuals and institutions. The business of controlled violence in the service of political 

interest demands real attention to detail and real results. Complex organizations of people 

with large amounts of equipment must be trained and conditioned to survive under 

conditions of significant privation and great stress, moved to the right place at the right 

time, and thrust into action against an adversary determined to kill or maim in frustrating 

the accomplishment of their goals. Those who cannot get things done in this brutal and 

unforgiving milieu soon fall by the wayside. 

Second, war demands the disciplined acceptance of lawful orders even when such orders 

can lead to one's own death or disfigurement. A Soldier, Sailor, Marine, or Airman 

unwilling to follow orders is a contradiction in terms. Thus, there is an inherent bias in 

military personnel to obey rather than to question. On the whole, this tendency does more 

good than harm, but it tends to limit theoretical contemplation. 

Finally, war is episodic. Copernicus could look at the movement of the planets on any 

clear night and at the sun on any clear day. But war comes and goes, rather like some 

inexplicable disease, and the resulting discontinuities make it a difficult phenomenon 

about which to theorize. 

I do not mean to imply that the military profession is inherently antitheoretical. There are 

countervailing tendencies. As both Sun Tzu and Clausewitz cogently observed, the very 

seriousness of war provides a healthy stimulus to contemplation.23 Its episodic nature, 

while restricting opportunity for direct observation, does provide opportunity for 

reflection. Furthermore, the very complexity of war, while limiting the ability of theorists 

to master it, creates incentives for military practitioners to discover simplifying notions 

that reduce its seeming intractability. And we would not have seen the appearance of 

institutions of higher military learning, societies for the study of the martial past, or a 

virtual explosion of military literature over the last 20 years were there not some 

glimmerings of intellectual activity surrounding the conduct of war. 
But the larger point remains: there are underlying truths about both theory and the 

military profession that make the relationship between the two problematic at best. 

Despite this inherently uneasy relationship, there is sufficient evidence that theory has 

utility in military affairs to justify probing more deeply. In doing so, I would like to 

follow a dual track: to explore the question of what utility theory should have for military 

institutions and what utility it actually does have. In investigating the former, the study is 

confined to the opinions of theorists and educators. In the latter, it plumbs the empirical 

evidence. But an important caveat before proceeding: tracing connections between 

thought and action is intrinsically difficult. When the nature of the thought is conceptual, 

rather than pragmatic, as theory is bound to be, such sleuthing becomes even more 

challenging, and one frequently is forced to rely on inferential conjecture and even a bit 

of imagination to connect the deed to an antecedent proposition. 

The Theorists Make Their Case 

A narrow but rich body of discourse about theory's contribution to individual military 

judgment is densely packed in On War. Clausewitz's line of thought is most cogently 

revealed in book two, "On the Theory of War." He begins this discourse by classifying 

war into the related but distinct fields of tactics and strategy. He follows with a stinging 

critique of the theories of his day that seek to exclude from war three of its most 

important characteristics: the action of moral forces, the frustrating power of the enemy's 

will, and the endemic uncertainty of information. From this, he deduces that "a positive 

teaching is unattainable."24 Clausewitz sees two ways out of this difficulty. The first is to 

admit baldly that whatever theory is developed will have decreasing validity at the higher 

levels of war where "almost all solutions must be left to imaginative intellect."25 The 

second is to argue that theory is a tool to aid the contemplative mind rather than a guide 

for action. 

This formulation leads to some of the most majestic passages of On War. Theory is "an 

analytical investigation leading to a close acquaintance with the subject; applied to 

experience—in our case, to military history—it leads to thorough familiarity with it." 

Clausewitz elaborates: 

Theory will have fulfilled its main task when it is used to analyze the 

constituent elements of war, to distinguish precisely what at first seems 

fused, to explain in full the properties of the means employed and to show 

their probable effects, to define clearly the nature of the ends in view, and 

to illuminate all phases of war through critical inquiry. Theory then 

becomes a guide to anyone who wants to learn about war from books; it 

will light his way, ease his progress, train his judgment, and help him 

avoid pitfalls. . . . Theory exists so that one need not start afresh each time 

sorting out the material and plowing through it, but will find it ready to 

hand and in good order. It is meant to educate the mind of the future 

commander, or, more accurately, to guide him in his self-education, not to 

accompany him to the battlefield; just as a wise teacher guides and 
stimulates a young man's intellectual development, but is careful not to 

lead him by the hand for the rest of his life.26 

This view of theory has a particular implication for military pedagogy. It requires that 

education begin with broad principles, rather than an accumulation of technical details. 

"Great things alone," Clausewitz argued, "can make a great mind, and petty things will 

make a petty mind unless a man rejects them as alien."27 But Clausewitz also makes it 

abundantly clear that the cumulative insights derived from theory must ultimately find 

practical expression: 

The knowledge needed by a senior commander is distinguished by the fact 

that it can only be attained by a special talent, through the medium of 

reflection, study, and thought: an intellectual instinct which extracts the 

essence from the phenomena of life, as a bee sucks honey from a flower. 

In addition to study and reflection, life itself serves as a source. 

Experience, with its wealth of lessons, will never produce a Newton or an 

Euler, but it may well bring forth the higher calculations of a Condé or a 

Frederick. . . . By total assimilation with his mind and life, the 

commander's knowledge must be transformed into a genuine capability. . . 

. It [theory] will be sufficient if it helps the commander acquire those 

insights that, once absorbed into his way of thinking, will smooth and 

protect his progress, and will never force him to abandon his convictions 

for the sake of any objective fact.28 

Thus, a century before Carl Becker advanced the proposition that "Mr. Everyman" had to 

be his own historian in order to function effectively in daily life, Clausewitz argued that 

every commander had to be his own theorist in order to function effectively in war.29 In 

Clausewitz's view, the essential role of theory was to aid the commander in his total 

learning, which synthesized study, experience, observation, and reflection into a coherent 

whole, manifested as an ever-alert, perceptive military judgment. 

There is, however, another view of the utility of theory, most famously articulated by 

Baron Antoine Henri de Jomini, Clausewitz's chief competitor in this arena. Jomini 

indeed believed in the power of positive teaching. Although he was prepared to admit 

that war as a whole was an art, strategy—the main subject of his work—was "regulated 

by fixed laws resembling those of the positive sciences."30 Following this pointcounterpoint formula again, he conceded that bad morale and accidents could prevent 

victory, but: 

These truths need not lead to the conclusion that there can be no sound 

rules in war, the observance of which, the chances being equal, will lead to 

success. It is true that theories cannot teach men with mathematical 

precision what they should do in every possible case; but it is also certain 

that they will always point out the errors which should be avoided; and 

this is a highly important consideration, for these rules thus become, in the 
hands of skillful generals commanding brave troops, means of almost 

certain success.31 

This fundamental belief in the efficacy of prescriptive theory led Jomini to formulate his 

theory itself much differently than Clausewitz. At the epicenter of Clausewitz's theory, 

we find a trinity of the elemental forces of war—violence, chance, and reason—acting on 

each other in multifarious ways, whose dynamics the statesman and commander must 

thoroughly consider before deciding whether to go to war and how to conduct it.32 

Jomini's central proposition consists of a series of four maxims about strategy that he 

summarized as "bringing the greatest part of the forces of an army upon the important 

point of a theater of war or of the zone of operations."33 Jomini's principle-based approach 

to theory has had great endurance over the years. It perhaps found its most complete 

expression in J.F.C. Fuller's The Foundations of the Science of War, a treatise whose nine 

didactic imperatives, each expressed as a single word or short phrase, continue to 

resonate in contemporary doctrinal manuals.34 

Clausewitz's and Jomini's views of theory were not mutually exclusive. Jomini addressed 

some of the wider considerations of policy central to Clausewitz, particularly in the 

opening chapter of The Art of War.

35 And Clausewitz occasionally engaged in formulaic 

statements, perhaps most notably in his observation that "destruction of the enemy force 

is always the superior, more effective means, with which others cannot compete."36 

Nevertheless, their two approaches—one descriptive, the other prescriptive—represent 

the two normative poles concerning the utility of theory.

But we find useful insights into the utility of theory from more modern observers as well. 

In his 1959 foreword to Henry E. Eccles's important but much-neglected work, Logistics 

in the National Defense, Henry M. Wriston, then president of the American Assembly at 

Columbia University, opined, "Theory is not just dreams or wishful thinking. It is the 

orderly interpretation of accumulated experience and its formal enunciation as a guide to 

future intelligent action to better that experience."37 In this pithy and elegant formulation, 

Wriston captures an important truth: the fundamental social utility of theory is to help 

realize man's almost universal longing to make his future better than his past. The fact 

that the book that followed offered a theory of military logistics was but a particular 

manifestation of a general verity. Several years later, J.C. Wylie, a reflective, combatexperienced Sailor, developed a formulation similar to Wriston's that described the 

mechanics of translating theory into action: 

Theory serves a useful purpose to the extent that it can collect and 

organize the experiences and ideas of other men, sort out which of them 

may have a valid transfer value to a new and different situation, and help 

the practitioner to enlarge his vision in an orderly, manageable and useful 

fashion—and then apply it to the reality with which he is faced.38 

In sum, there are two somewhat polar philosophies of how theory should influence 

practice. In the Clausewitzian view, it does so indirectly by educating the judgment of the 

practitioner; in the Jominian view, it does so directly by providing the practitioner 
concrete guides to action. Wriston and Wylie, both slightly more Clausewitzian than 

Jominian, provide a useful synthesis and update of Clausewitz and Jomini, rearticulating 

the value of theory to the military professional. 

Influence of Theory on Military Institutions 

In the modern age, theory has its most immediate influence on military institutions in the 

form of doctrine, a sort of stepping stone between theory and application. Along a scale 

stretching from the purely abstract to the purely concrete, doctrine occupies something of 

a middle ground representing a conceptual link between theory and practice. Having 

come much into vogue in the U.S. Armed Forces since the end of the Vietnam War and 

with its popularity propagated to many other institutions as well, doctrine also represents, 

in a sense, sanctioned theory. In other words, there are two principal distinctions between 

theory and doctrine: the latter is decidedly more pragmatic, and it is stamped with an 

institutional imprimatur. How does theory influence doctrine? Generally speaking, we 

would expect theory to provide general propositions and doctrine to assess the extent to 

which these strictures apply, fail to apply, or apply with qualifications in particular eras 

and under particular conditions. In other words, the intellectual influence flows from the 

general to the particular. But at times, the relationship is reversed. This occurs when 

doctrine seeks to deal with new phenomena for which theory has not yet been well 

developed, such as for the employment of nuclear weapons in the 1950s, or when 

doctrine developers themselves formulate new ways of categorizing or new relational 

propositions. In cases such as these, doctrine may drive theory. In seeking to examine the 

relationship between the two in detail, we will explore the theoretical underpinnings of 

the 1982 and 1986 statements of U.S. Army doctrine and the 1992 articulation of U.S. 

Air Force doctrine. 

Our first laboratory for exploring these relationships is the Army in the aftermath of the 

Vietnam War. In 1976, it promulgated Field Manual (FM) 100–5, Operations. This 

manual was deliberately crafted by its principal architect, General William E. DePuy, 

first commander of the U.S. Army Training and Doctrine Command (TRADOC), to 

shake the Army out of its post-Vietnam miasma and provide a conceptual framework for 

defeating a Soviet incursion into Western Europe.39 It succeeded in the first but failed in 

the second. DePuy definitely got the Army's attention, and he culturally transformed it 

from being indifferent toward doctrine to taking it quite seriously. But his fundamental 

concept of piling on in front of Soviet penetrations, which he referred to as the "Active 

Defense," did not find favor. It was seen as reactive, rather than responsive; dealing with 

the first battle, but not the last; and insufficiently attentive to Soviet formations in the 

second operational and strategic echelons. Thus, the stage was set for a new manual, a 

new concept, and a new marketing label. 

The new manual was the 1982 edition of FM 100–5; the new concept was to fight the 

Soviets in depth and hit them at unexpected times from unexpected directions; and the 

new marketing label was "AirLand Battle." The principal authors were two gifted 

officers, L.D. "Don" Holder and Huba Wass de Czege. Both had advanced degrees from 

Harvard University (Holder in history, Wass de Czege in public administration); both 
were combat veterans of the Vietnam War; and both were sound, practical soldiers. The 

manual they produced under the direction of General Donn A. Starry, DePuy's successor 

at TRADOC, was clearly informed by theory as well as history. From Clausewitz came 

notions such as the manual's opening sentence, "There is no simple formula for winning 

wars"; a quotation to the effect that "the whole of military activity must . . . relate directly 

or indirectly to the engagement"; "The objective of all operations is to destroy the 

opposing force"; and another direct citation characterizing the defense as a "shield of 

[well-directed] blows."40 But there was also a strong element of indirectness in the manual 

that one could trace to the ideas of Sun Tzu, who was mentioned by name, and Basil H. 

Liddell Hart, who was not. Sun Tzu was quoted to the effect that "rapidity is the essence 

of war; take advantage of the enemy's unreadiness, make your way by unexpected routes, 

and attack unguarded spots"; soldiers were adjured that "our tactics must appear formless 

to the enemy"; and one of the seven combat imperatives was to "direct friendly strengths 

against enemy weaknesses."41 Additionally, the manual's extensive discussion of "Deep 

Battle," which advocated striking well behind enemy lines to disrupt the commitment of 

reinforcements and subject the opposing force to piecemeal defeat, drew heavily on the 

legacy of Mikhail Tukhachevskii, V.K. Triandafillov, A.A. Svechin, and other Soviet 

thinkers of the 1920s and 1930s.42 Although it was politically infeasible to acknowledge 

this intellectual debt at the height of the Cold War, the apparent reasoning here was that 

one had to fight fire with fire. And the strong emphasis on "Deep Battle" was an 

outgrowth of an intensive study of Soviet military practices dating back to the earliest 

years of the Red Army. A further reflection of this debt was the introduction of a 

variation of the Soviet term operational art into the American military lexicon as the 

operational level of war.

43 

When the manual was updated 4 years later, a third author, Richard Hart Sinnreich, was 

brought into the work. Sinnreich's professional and academic credentials were just as 

sound as those of his two compatriots: combat time in Vietnam, an advanced degree in 

political science from The Ohio State University, and well-developed soldiering skills. 

Holder, Wass de Czege, and Sinnreich engaged in a collaborative effort that expanded 

and conceptualized the notion of operational art. But rather than associating the term 

operational strictly with large-scale operations, as had been done in the previous edition, 

the 1986 manual defined operational art as "the employment of military forces to attain 

strategic goals in a theater of war or theater of operations through the design, 

organization, and conduct of campaigns and major operations."44 This depiction of 

operational art as a conceptual link between tactical events (the building blocks of major 

operations) and strategic results significantly broadened the Soviet concept and made it 

applicable to the wide variety of types of wars that the U.S. Army might have to fight. It 

also harkened back to Clausewitz's definition of strategy as "the use of an engagement for 

the purpose of the war."45 The manual then ventured into some theory of its own in 

requiring the operational commander to address three issues: the conditions required to 

effect the strategic goal, the sequence of actions necessary to produce the conditions, and 

the resources required to generate the sequence of actions. The combination of a new 

definition of operational art and a framework for connecting resources, actions, and 

effects gave the manual an underlying coherence that made it an extremely valuable 

document in its day and an admirable example of the genre of doctrinal literature. 
Roughly contemporaneously with the publication of the second expression of the Army's 

AirLand Battle doctrine, a group of Airmen with a scholastic bent was assembled at the 

Airpower Research Institute (ARI) of the U.S. Air Force College of Aerospace Doctrine, 

Research, and Education to launch a bold experiment in the formulation of Air Force 

basic doctrine. This effort was based on an idea put forth by the highly respected Air 

Force historian Robert Frank Futrell, who opined that doctrine should be published with 

footnotes to document the evidence supporting the doctrinal statements.46 The ARI 

Director, Dennis M. Drew, a Strategic Air Command warrior who had served at Maxwell 

Air Force Base since the late 1970s and held an advanced degree in military history from 

the University of Alabama, decided to put Futrell's idea to the test. But he and his 

research/writing team ultimately determined to expand on Futrell's basic notion. They 

would publish the doctrine in two volumes. The first, relatively thin, document would 

contain the bare propositional inventory; the second, more substantial, tome would lay 

out the evidence upon which the statements in the first were based. The process involved 

a good deal of both research and argument; but by the eve of the 1991 Gulf War, Drew 

and his team had produced a workable first draft. Publication was delayed until 1992 to 

allow the Air Force to assimilate the experience of that war. The result was what Air 

Force Chief of Staff Merrill A. McPeak called "one of the most important documents 

published by the United States Air Force."47 Arguably, he was correct. No other American 

military Service had ever mustered the intellectual courage to put its analysis where its 

propositions were. It was potentially, in form alone, a paradigm for a new, analytically 

rigorous approach to the articulation of doctrine.48 

As one would suspect, the primary influence on the manual was empirical. Historical 

essays addressed issues such as the environment, capabilities, force composition, roles 

and missions, and employment of aerospace power as well as the sustainment, training, 

organizing, and equipping of aerospace forces.49 But there was a notable conceptual cant 

as well. The opening pages either paraphrased or quoted Clausewitz: "War is an 

instrument of political policy"; "the military objective in war is to compel the adversary 

to do our will"; and "war is characterized by 'fog, friction, and chance.'"50 And the notion 

that "an airman, acting as an air component commander, should be responsible for 

employing all air and space assets in the theater" was right out of Giulio Douhet and Billy 

Mitchell.51 There was also, like the 1982 version of FM 100–5, a nod in the direction of 

Sun Tzu and Liddell Hart: "Any enemy with the capacity to be a threat is likely to have 

strategic vulnerabilities susceptible to air attack; discerning those vulnerabilities is an 

airman's task."52 The only place that the propositional inventory appeared to be but thinly 

supported by underlying concepts or evidence was a page-and-a-quarter insert titled "An 

Airman's View," which contained a series of statements that could perhaps be summed up 

in a single aphorism: airpower does it better.53 Nevertheless, the 1992 statement of Air 

Force basic doctrine represented a bold, promising new approach to doctrinal formulation 

and articulation. Given this strong dose of intellectual rigor, it is not surprising that the 

experiment was short-lived.54 

Nevertheless, in summing up the actual interplay between theory and the military 

profession, we can conclude that the institutional relationship between military theory on 

the one hand and military doctrine on the other is fairly direct. 
Implications for a Theory of Spacepower 

Having surveyed the nature of military theory, the general relation between theory and 

the military profession, and the particular relationship between theory and doctrine, it 

remains to suggest a few implications of this analysis for the theory of spacepower. 

First, great care and extended debate should be devoted to articulating the central 

proposition, or main idea, of spacepower theory. One that is cast narrowly to focus only 

on spacepower's contributions to national security will take the theory in one direction. 

One that is cast more broadly to acknowledge spacepower's contributions to the 

expansion of man's knowledge of the universe will take it in another. Within the narrower 

ambit of national security, the construct of the theory should be informed by its purpose, 

which is related to the target audience. Here, Clausewitz's admonition is germane. In this 

author's opinion, one should not aim at some sort of positivist teaching that will spell out 

in precise and unambiguous fashion exactly what some future space forces commander or 

policymaker influencing the development of spacepower should do in a given situation. 

Rather, the theory should aim to assist the self-education of such individuals. To do this, 

it should focus on explanatory relationships within categories of spacepower itself and 

among spacepower and other related fields in the military-political universe. Given the 

relative newness of spacepower as both an instrument of military force and a vehicle for 

scientific exploration, and given as well the speed at which technological developments 

are likely to alter the physics of relationships among space-power subfields, it should be 

the tenor of a spacepower theory to develop a fairly firm list of questions that will inform 

the development and employment of spacepower but to recognize that the answers to 

those questions can change both rapidly and unexpectedly and must, therefore, remain 

rather tentative. Finally, it would be helpful to use the five-fold functions of definition, 

categorization, explanation, connection, and anticipation as a heuristic device to check 

the work for its efficacy and relevance. Such a review will not guarantee a useful product. 

It may, however, help to reduce errors and to sharpen the analysis of relevant issues. 

In summary, both the nature and history of military theory indicate that the task of 

developing a comprehensive, constructive theory of space-power will not be easy. Nor 

can the present attempt be considered the final word on the subject. It can, nevertheless, 

move the dialogue on spacepower to a new and more informed level and thus make a 

worthwhile contribution to the enhancement of national security and perhaps to the 

conduct of broader pursuits as well.

Notes

1. The terms of reference establishing the need for a theory of spacepower specifically alluded to this 

rationale, noting that "the lack of a space power theory is most notable to the national security 

sector. Military theorists such as Clausewitz, Mahan, and Douhet have produced definitive works 

for land, sea, and air, but there is not such comparable resource for circumterrestrial space." 

Thomas G. Behling, Deputy Under Secretary of Defense (Preparation and Warning), "Space 
Power Theory Terms of Reference," enclosure to memorandum to President, National Defense 

University, February 13, 2006, Subject: Space Power Theory, 1. 

2. Perhaps the most apposite example of this contrast is the difference between French and German 

military concepts in the years between World Wars I and II and the resultant campaign outcomes. 

On the French, see Robert Allan Doughty, Seeds of Disaster: The Development of French Army 

Doctrine 1919–1939 (Hamden, CT: Archon Books, 1985); on the Germans, see James S. Corum, 

The Roots of Blitzkrieg: Hans von Seeckt and German Military Reform (Lawrence: University 

Press of Kansas, 1992). 

3. The argument here begins with a discussion of theory in a general sense. However, when the word 

theory is applied to the field of war, it becomes military theory in the classical sense of that term—

that is, a systematic, codified body of propositions about the art and science of war and war 

preparation. 

4. Webster's Encyclopedic Unabridged Dictionary of the English Language (New York: Gramercy 

Books, 1996), 1967. 

5. Carl von Clausewitz, On War, ed. and trans. Michael Howard and Peter Paret (Princeton: 

Princeton University Press, 1989), 75. 

6. Ibid., 87. 

7. Perhaps the most spirited assault on Clausewitz's notion that war is an extension of politics is 

found in John Keegan, A History of Warfare (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1993), 3–60. For an 

equally spirited rejoinder, see Christopher Bassford, "John Keegan and the Grand Tradition of 

Trashing Clausewitz: A Polemic," War in History 1 (November 1994), 319–336. 

8. Clausewitz, 128. 

9. Ibid., 611–637. 

10. For a fascinating description of how Copernicus developed his new view of the universe, see 

Thomas S. Kuhn, The Copernican Revolution: Planetary Astronomy in the Development of 

Western Thought (1957; reprint, Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1999), 134–184. 

11. The roots and early study of operational art are succinctly described in David M. Glantz, Soviet 

Military Operational Art: In Pursuit of Deep Battle (London: Frank Cass, 1991), 17–38. 

12. Alfred Thayer Mahan, The Influence of Sea Power upon History, 1660–1783, 12th ed. (Boston: 

Little, Brown, 1918), 25. 

13. Ibid., 29–89. Mahan's factors include a country's geographical position, physical conformation, 

extent of territory, size of population, national character, and the character of its government. 

14. Albert Einstein's lead essay in the collection Science et Synthèse (Paris: Gallimard, 1967), 28, 

cited in Gerald Holton, Thematic Origins of Scientific Thought: Kepler to Einstein (Cambridge: 

Harvard University Press, 1980), 357. 

15. The MacTutor History of Mathematics Archive, "Mathematical Discovery of Planets," available at 

<www.gap.dcs.st-and.ac.uk/~history/HistTopics/Neptune_and_Pluto.html>. 

16. Mikhail Tukhachevskii, "The Red Army's New (1936) Field Service Regulations," in Richard 

Simpkin, Deep Battle: The Brainchild of Marshal Tukhachevskii (London: Brassey's Defence 

Publishers, 1987), 170. 

17. Michael Howard, "Military Science in an Age of Peace," Journal of the Royal United Services 

Institute for Defence Studies 119 (March 1974), 7. 

18. Clausewitz's unfinished note, presumably written in 1830; Clausewitz, On War, 70. 

19. Mahan, 9. 

20. Julian S. Corbett, Some Principles of Maritime Strategy, introduction and notes by Eric J. Grove 

(1911; reprint, Annapolis, MD: Naval Institute Press, 1988), 15–51. 

21. Clausewitz, 134–136; Corbett, 107–152; J.F.C. Fuller, The Foundations of the Science of War 

(London: Hutchinson, 1926), 19–47. 

22. Holton attempts to capture the essential qualities of scientific genius in Thematic Origins of 

Scientific Thought, 353–380. His major focus in this investigation is the genius's ability to work in 

the mental realm of apparent opposites. Although I am not equating the ability to formulate theory 

with genius, I am arguing that such formulation requires many of the same qualities that Holton 

describes. 

23. "War is a matter of vital importance to the State; the province of life or death; the road to survival 

or ruin. It is mandatory that it be thoroughly studied." Sun Tzu, The Art of War, trans. Samuel B. 

Griffith (New York: Oxford University Press, 1963), 63; "War is not pastime; it is no mere joy in 
daring and winning, no place for irresponsible enthusiasts. It is a serious means to a serious end," 

Clausewitz, 86. 

24. Clausewitz, 140. In the Paret-Howard translation, the phrase reads, "A Positive Doctrine is 

Unattainable." The text comes from a subchapter heading, "Eine positive Lehre ist unmöglich." 

Carl von Clausewitz, Vom Kriege, 19th ed., ed. Werner Hahlweg (Bonn: Ferd. Dümmlers Verlag, 

1991), 289. The rendering of the German Lehre as doctrine is certainly acceptable. However, in 

light of the very specific military connotation that the term doctrine has developed since the early 

1970s as being officially sanctioned principles that guide the actions of armed forces, I have 

chosen to render Lehre as the somewhat more general term teaching. 

25. Clausewitz, On War, 140. 

26. Ibid., 141. 

27. Ibid., 145. 

28. Ibid., 146–147. 

29. Carl Becker, "Everyman His Own Historian," American Historical Review XXXVII (January 

1932), 221–236; reprinted in Carl L. Becker, Everyman His Own Historian: Essays on History 

and Politics (New York: F.S. Crofts, 1935), 233–255. 

30. Baron Antoine Henri de Jomini, The Art of War, trans. G.H. Mendell and W.P. Craighill (1862; 

reprint, Westport, CT: Greenwood Press, 1971), 321. 

31. Ibid., 323. 

32. Clausewitz, On War, 89. Clausewitz's description of the three elements provides a strong 

indication of his lack of dogmatism: "These three tendencies are like three different codes of law, 

deep-rooted in their subject and yet variable in their relationship to one another. A theory that 

ignores any one of them or seeks to fix an arbitrary relationship between them would conflict with 

reality to such an extent that for this reason alone it would be totally useless." 

33. Jomini, 322. The maxims themselves are found on page 70. 

34. The derivation of these nine principles is laid out in Fuller, 208–229. Fuller named them 

Direction, Concentration, Distribution, Determination, Surprise, Endurance, Mobility, Offensive 

Action, and Security. The U.S. Air Force's current list of principles of war includes Unity of 

Command, Objective, Offensive, Mass, Maneuver, Economy of Force, Security, Surprise, and 

Simplicity. Air Force Basic Doctrine: AF Doctrine Document 1, November 17, 2003, 19–26, 

available at <www.dtic.mil/doctrine/jel/service_pubs/afdd1.pdf>. Contemporary joint doctrine 

contains precisely the same list of the principles of war as the Air Force's but adds three "Other 

Principles": Restraint, Perseverance, and Legitimacy. Joint Publication 3–0, Joint Operations, 

September 17, 2006, II–2, available at <www.dtic.mil/doctrine/jel/new_pubs/jp3_0.pdf>. 

35. Jomini, 16–39. The chapter is titled "The Relation of Diplomacy to War." 

36. Clausewitz, On War, 97. 

37. Henry M. Wriston, foreword to Henry E. Eccles, Logistics in the National Defense (1959; reprint, 

Washington, DC: Headquarters, United States Marine Corps, 1989), vii. 

38. J.C. Wylie, Military Strategy: A General Theory of Power Control (1967; reprint, Annapolis, MD: 

Naval Institute Press, n.d.), 31. 

39. For DePuy's pivotal role in the formulation of the 1976 edition of FM 100–5 and the reaction 

thereto, see Romie L. Brownlee and William J. Mullen III, Changing an Army: An Oral History of 

General William E. DePuy, USA Retired (Carlisle Barracks, PA: United States Military History 

Institute, n.d.), 187–189, and John L. Romjue, From Active Defense to AirLand Battle: The 

Development of Army Doctrine 1973–1982 (Fort Monroe, VA: United States Army Training and 

Doctrine Command, 1984), 3–21. 

40. Department of the Army, Field Manual 100–5, Operations (Washington, DC: Department of the 

Army, 1982), 1–1, 1–4, 2–1, and 11–1. 

41. Ibid., 2–1, 2–8. 

42. Ibid., 7–13 through 7–17. 

43. Ibid., 2–3. 

44. Department of the Army, Field Manual 100–5, Operations (Washington, DC: Department of the 

Army, 1986), 10. 

45. Clausewitz, On War, 76. This definition, as the drafters of the manual were well aware, was much 

more conceptual than Jomini's description of strategy as "the art of making war upon the map." 

Jomini, Art of War, 69. 
46. Interview with Professor Dennis M. Drew, School of Advanced Air and Space Studies, March 11, 

2004. In addition to an extremely detailed history of U.S. Air Force operations in the Korean War, 

Futrell produced a two-volume compilation titled Ideas, Concepts, Doctrine: Basic Thinking in the 

United States Air Force (Maxwell Air Force Base, AL: Air University Press, 1989). 

47. Department of the Air Force, Air Force Manual 1–1, Basic Aerospace Doctrine of the United 

States Air Force, 2 vols. (Washington, DC: Department of the Air Force, 1992), 1:v. 

48. For a detailed assessment of this groundbreaking work, see Harold R. Winton, "Reflections on the 

Air Force's New Manual," Military Review 72 (November 1992), 20–31. 

49. Air Force Manual 1–1, 2:i. 

50. Ibid., 1:1–2. 

51. Ibid., 1:9. 

52. Ibid., 1:12. 

53. Ibid., 1:15–16. 

54. The subsequent statement of Air Force basic doctrine, published in 1997, reverted to the 

traditional format. See Department of the Air Force, Air Force Doctrine Document 1, Air Force 

Basic Doctrine (Maxwell Air Force Base, AL: Headquarters, Air Force Doctrine Center, 1997). 
Chapter 3:

International Relations Theory and Spacepower

Robert L. Pfaltzgraff, Jr.

The traditional focus of international relations (IR) theory has been peace and war, 

cooperation and competition, among the political units into which the world is divided—

principally states, but also increasingly nonstate actors in the 21st century. Until the 

advent of technologies for air- and spacepower, all interaction took place on the Earth's 

surface. With the development of manned flight, followed by our ability to venture into 

space, international relations expanded to include the new dimension provided by the air 

and space environment. Just as terrestrial geography framed the historic setting for 

international relations, space is already being factored more fully into 21st-century IR 

theory, especially as rivalries on Earth, together with perceived requirements for 

cooperation, are projected into space. The foundations for the explicit consideration of 

space exist in IR theory. In all likelihood, new theories eventually will emerge to take 

account of the novel features of space as we come to know more about this environment. 

For the moment, however, we will think about space with our theories about Earth-bound 

political relationships as our essential point of departure. Just as we have extended 

Eurocentric IR theory to the global setting of the 21st century, such theories will be tested 

in space. Because all IR theories either describe or prescribe interactions and 

relationships, space becomes yet another arena in which to theorize about the behavior of 

the world's political units. The assumption that theories developed for Earth-bound 

relationships apply in space will be reinforced, modified, or rejected as we come to know 

more about human interaction in space. We may theorize about IR theory as it applies to 

the relationships between entities in space as well as how space affects the relationship 

between political units on Earth. We may also speculate about the extent to which space 

would eliminate or mitigate conflicts or promote cooperation between formerly hostile 

Earthly units if they found it necessary to confront an extraterrestrial foe. Such issues 

open other areas for speculation and discussion, including the potential implications of IR 

theory as space becomes an arena in which Earthly units attempt to enhance their position 

on Earth and eventually to establish themselves more extensively in space. 

We need not live in fantasyland to think about the extension of Earthly life to space. This 

could include orbiting space stations building on the achievements of recent decades as 

well as colonies of people whose forebears originated on Earth but who have established 

themselves far from Earth. The need for IR theory about space could also arise from the 

development of transportation and communication routes among space colonies and 

space stations, and between peoples living on asteroids and the Moon as well as other 

planets. We may think of asteroids as either fragmenting objects that could destroy or 

alter Earth or as a basis for extending man's reach into space. As Martin Ira Glassner 

points out, such activities in space environments "will inevitably generate questions of 

nationality and nationalism and sovereignty, of ownership and use of resources, of the 
distribution of costs and benefits, of social stratification and cultural differences, of law 

and loyalties and rivalries and politics, of frontiers and boundaries and power, and 

perhaps of colonial empires and wars of independence."1 This will provide a fertile 

environment for theorizing about existing and potential political relationships. We will 

come to understand more fully the extent to which Earthly theories can be projected onto 

space or the need to evolve entirely new ways of thinking about space. Because space is 

not the exclusive domain of governments, theories will include private sector entities as 

well. In this respect, the present IR theory emphasis on states as well as actors other than 

states has direct applicability. 

Colonization of the Moon, asteroids, and planets would present humans with challenges 

to survival in space not encountered on Earth. We would greatly enhance scientific 

knowledge in a setting with greater or lesser levels of gravity and potentially lethal 

cosmic ray exposure, to mention only the most obvious differences with Earthly life. At 

the same time, we would face far different circumstances related to political and social 

relationships. For example, the challenges to survival would probably be so great that the 

rights of the individual might be sacrificed to the needs of the collective, or rugged 

individualism and self-reliance would be essential. Space colonies would be dependent 

for a time on their mother country on Earth but increasingly would be compelled by vast 

distances and time measured by years from Earth to fend for themselves. Barring 

dramatic technological advances that compress such travel time, the interactive capability 

of space colonies, whether with each other or with Earth, would be extremely limited. A 

premium would be placed on independence, and leadership would be measured by the 

ability to adapt to new and harsh circumstances. 

There are many other unknowns concerning political and social relationships in space. 

We literally do not know what we do not know. Would Earthly religions be strengthened 

or weakened by space knowledge? It cannot be known in advance whether space 

colonization would reinforce existing social science theory about the behavior of 

individuals or groups with each other or lead to dramatic differences. For example, under 

what conditions in space would there be a propensity for greater conflict or for greater 

cooperation? In the absence of such experience in space, we have little choice but to 

extrapolate from existing IR theory to help us understand such relationships in space. In 

any event, the testing of theory about interaction of humans in space lies in the future. 

Our more immediate goal is to gain a greater understanding of how IR theory can (and 

does) inform our thinking about the near-term space issues, notably how space shapes the 

power of Earthly states, while we also speculate about the longer term issue of social 

science theory and relationships within and between groups in space. Thus, we think first 

about the extension of capabilities of states into space as a basis for enhancing their 

position on Earth and only subsequently about how sociopolitical relationships might 

evolve between space-based entities far from Earth. 

The huge expanse of space provides a rich basis for theory development about relations 

between the Earth and the other bodies of the solar system and ultimately perhaps 

between these entities themselves. If social science theorizing is based on our images 

about the world surrounding us, how we imagine, or develop images about, the evolution 
of such relationships can only give new meaning to the word imagination as a basis for 

future IR theory. What is unique about space is the fact that we are dealing with infinity. 

Whereas the terrestrial land mass and the seas have knowable finite bounds, we literally 

do not know where space ends or understand the implications of infinity for how we 

theorize about space. In its space dimension, IR theory will evolve as emerging and 

future technologies permit the more extensive exploration, and perhaps even the 

colonization, of parts of the solar system and the exploitation of its natural resources, 

beginning with the Moon and ultimately extending beyond our solar system. As in the 

case of Earth-bound geopolitical theorizing, the significance of space will be determined 

by technologies that facilitate the movement of people, resources, and other capabilities. 

Those technologies may be developed as a result of our assumptions about the 

geopolitical or strategic significance of space extrapolated from IR theory and the 

requirements that are set forth in our space-power strategy. 

From IR theory we derive the notion, building on geography, that a new arena becomes 

first an adjunct to the security and well-being of the primary unit and, later, a setting to be 

controlled for its own sake. Airpower was first envisaged as a basis for enhancing ground 

operations but subsequently became an arena that had to be defended for its own sake 

because of the deployment of vulnerable assets such as heavy bombers. As technologies 

become more widely available, they are acquired by increasing numbers of actors. Such 

technologies proliferate from the core to the periphery, from the most advanced states to 

others. Space becomes first an environment for superpower competition, as during the 

Cold War, to be followed by larger numbers of states developing space programs. At 

least 35 countries now have space research programs that are designed to either augment 

existing space capabilities or lead to deployments in space. Others are likely to emerge in 

the decades ahead. 

IR theory has long emphasized power relationships, including the extent to which power 

is the most important variable for understanding the behavior of the political units into 

which the world is divided. The theory addresses questions such as: How pervasive is the 

quest for power, and how should power be defined? Given its centrality to IR theory, 

power in the form of spacepower represents a logical extension of this concept. 

Spacepower consists of capabilities whose most basic purpose is to control and regulate 

the use of space. This includes the ability, in the words of the 2006 U.S. National Space 

Policy, to maintain "freedom of action in space" as vital to national interests. According 

to the National Space Policy, "United States national security is critically dependent upon 

space capabilities, and this dependence will grow." 

All Presidents since Dwight Eisenhower have stated that preserving freedom of passage 

in space is a vital U.S. interest that should be protected for all of humankind. Freedom of 

passage through space represents a norm embodied in the 1967 Outer Space Treaty. This 

is analogous to sea control, which encompasses freedom of passage in peacetime and the 

ability to deny an enemy the use of the seas during wartime. In the future, the interests of 

space powers will be in assuring safe passage for themselves and for their allies, while 

denying such access to their enemies. In practice, this means that, like the seas, space will 

become an arena for both competition and cooperation as political issues, including 
security, are extended from their terrestrial environment into space. Because IR theory 

has both a descriptive and prescriptive focus on competition and cooperation, it 

inevitably becomes the basis for speculation and theorization about such relationships in 

space, including spacepower. 

Definitions of spacepower focus on the ability, as Colin Gray points out, to use space and 

to deny its use to enemies.2 Spacepower is a multifaceted concept that, like power in IR 

theory, is "complex, indeterminate, and intangible," as Peter L. Hays put it.3 Spacepower 

includes the possession of capabilities to conduct military operations in and from space 

and to utilize space for commercial and other peaceful purposes. Such capabilities have 

been increasing in the decades since the first German V2 rockets passed through the outer 

edge of space en route to their targets in England in the final months of World War II and 

the Soviets launched the first Sputnik in 1957. These events made space a military arena. 

In recent decades, space has become an essential setting for precision, stealth, command 

and control, intelligence collection, and maneuverability of weapons systems. In addition 

to its military uses, space has also become indispensable to civilian communications and 

a host of other commercial applications. Strategies for dissuasion and deterrence in the 

21st century depend heavily on the deployment of capabilities in space. As a concept, 

spacepower broadens the domain of IR theory from the traditional horizontal 

geographical configuration of the Earth divided into land and the seas to include the 

vertical dimension that extends from airspace to outer space. 

Because spacepower enables and enhances a state's ability to achieve national security, 

IR theory will be deficient if it does not give space more prominent consideration. In the 

decades ahead, spacepower theory and IR theory will draw symbiotically on each other. 

It is increasingly impossible to envisage one without the other. Space is an arena in which 

competition and cooperation are already set forth in terms and issues reminiscent of 

Earth-bound phenomena. Spacepower includes assumptions drawn from IR theory. Our 

theories about the political behavior of states and other entities in space are extensions of 

our hypotheses about terrestrial power. To the extent that our theories emphasize 

competition on Earth, we theorize in similar fashion about such interactions in the 

domain of space. If we emphasize the need for regimes to codify and regulate Earthbound relationships, we extend such thinking to the dimension represented by space. 

Indeed, the ongoing debates about space, including its militarization and weaponization, 

have direct reference points to IR theory. The inclusion of space in IR theory will evolve 

as we incorporate space into national security because IR theory, like social science 

theory in general, is contextual. As E.H. Carr has written: "Purpose, whether we are 

conscious of it or not, is a condition of thought; and thinking for thinking's sake is as 

abnormal and barren as the miser's accumulation of money for its own sake."4 We 

theorize, or speculate, about relationships among the variables that constitute the world 

that exists at any time. 

However, states in some instances work with other states to develop cooperative 

arrangements that govern their relationships. It is to be expected that they would 

undertake efforts to regulate their operations in space as they do on Earth by developing 

legal and political regimes based on normative standards. Cooperative arrangements are 
already deemed necessary to prevent the stationing of weapons of mass destruction in 

space. It is the goal of our adversaries to place limits on U.S. terrestrial activities, and it 

would be unusual to expect them to try to do otherwise in space. Space becomes another 

arena for states to attempt to limit the activities of other states and to develop "rules of the 

road" favorable to their interests and activities. Thus, we have the basis for theory that 

prescribes how political entities in space should possibly interact with each other, 

including the kinds of regimes and regulations states may seek to develop in space. 

At this early stage in space, we have already devoted extensive intellectual energy to 

prescribing how such entities should relate to each other. According to E.H. Carr, 

because "purpose, or teleology, precedes and conditions thought, at the beginning of the 

establishment of a new field of inquiry the element of wish is overwhelmingly strong."5 

This leads to normative thinking about how we would like human behavior to evolve in 

space. Carr was describing IR theory as it developed in the early decades of the 20th 

century. However, IR theory was erected on a rich base of historical experience dating 

from the Westphalian state system that had arisen in the mid-17th century. There is as yet 

no comparable basis for developing and testing theories about political relationships in 

space. With this important caveat in mind, we turn first to IR theory and spacepower in 

its geopolitical, or geostrategic, setting and then to other efforts, existing and potential, to 

theorize about space and to link IR theory to spacepower. Subsequent sections deal with 

geopolitics, realist theory, liberal theory, and constructivism. 

Geopolitics and IR Theory 

The process of theorizing about space is most advanced in the area of the geopolitics of 

the domain. This is a derivative of classical geopolitical theory. According to Everett C. 

Dolman, geopolitical theory developed for the Earth and its geographical setting can be 

transferred to outer space with the "strategic application of new and emerging 

technologies within a framework of geographic, topographic, and positional knowledge."6 

He has developed a construct that he terms Astropolitik, defined as "the extension of 

primarily nineteenth- and twentieth-century theories of global geopolitics into the vast 

context of the human conquest of outer space."7 Although space has a unique geography, 

strategic principles that govern terrestrial geopolitical relationships nevertheless can be 

applied. States have behavioral characteristics, notably a quest for national security, that 

exist on Earth but that may also govern state behavior in space, thus opening the way for 

consideration of those theories about national interest as states acquire interests and 

capabilities in space. Dolman suggests that geopolitical analysis can be folded into the 

realist image of interstate competition extended into space. 

Geopolitical theory represents a rich and enduring part of the literature of IR theory. In 

fact, all IR theory is based on environing factors that are physical (geography) and 

nonphysical (social or cultural), as Harold and Margaret Sprout have pointed out.

8 As the 

Sprouts recognized, all human behavior takes place in a geographic setting whose 

features shape what humans do or cannot do. Although geography pertains to the 

mapping of the Earth's surface, its physical differentiation has important implications for 

the behavior of the units that inhabit the various parts of the world, for example, as land 
or sea powers and now space powers. Thus, geography is crucially important. However, 

the significance of specific aspects of geography, or geographic location, changes as 

technology changes. For example, technology has exerted a direct influence on how wars 

are fought and how commercial activity has developed. As the seas became the dominant 

medium for the movement of trade and commerce, port cities developed. As land 

transportation evolved, junctions and highway intersections shaped land values. As 

resource needs changed, the importance of the geographical locations of resources such 

as reserves of coal or oil rose. If vitally important natural resources are found in 

abundance in certain locations in space, their geopolitical importance will be enhanced. 

The exploitation of such resources may become the basis for international cooperation or 

competition in order to secure or preserve access. 

Central in the writings of classical geopolitical theorists such as Alfred Thayer Mahan 

and Sir Halford Mackinder is the direct relationship between technology and power 

projection. As long as technology favored the extension of power over the oceans 

(Mahan), those states most fully able to build and deploy naval forces were preeminent. 

The advent of the technological means for rapid movement of large forces over land 

(Mackinder), and subsequently for flight through the Earth's atmosphere, transformed not 

only the ways in which war could be waged, but also the hierarchy of states with the 

necessary capabilities. Thus, there was a close relationship between technology and the 

utilization, both for military and civilian purposes, of the Earth's surfaces— maritime and 

land—as well as the surrounding atmosphere and exosphere. Such a frame of reference 

emerges from the analysis of historic technological-strategic-economic relationships. 

Similarly, the existence of technologies for the transport of formerly Earth-bound objects 

into outer space has implications for both military and civilian activities at least as great 

as those changes that accompanied the great technological innovations of the past. 

Historically, geopolitical theorists tell us, technology has had the effect of altering the 

significance of specific spatial relationships. The advent of the airplane, and subsequently 

the means to penetrate outer space, provided a whole new dimension to geopolitics. As 

long as human activities were restricted to the Earth's surface, they were subject to 

constraints imposed by the terrain. Although the seas are uniform in character, human 

mobility via the oceans is limited by the coastlines that surround them. No such 

constraints exist above the Earth's surface, in airspace or in outer space. In this 

environment, the possibilities of unprecedented mobility and speed enable states to seek 

either to protect their interests or project their power. For such purposes, they may exploit 

opportunities for surveillance, reconnaissance, and verification, as well as the potential 

afforded by space as an arena for offensive and defensive operations. 

Just as geopolitical theorists have set forth their ideas about the political significance of 

specific geographical features, comparable efforts have been made to address 

"geography" in space. Writing on the geopolitics of space focuses on gravity and orbits. 

Gravity is said to be the most important factor in the topography of space because it 

shapes the "hills and valleys" of space, which are known as gravity wells. A simple 

astropolitical (geopolitical) proposition has been set forth: the more massive the body, 

such as a planet or moon, the deeper the gravity well. The expenditure of energy in travel 
from one point to another in space is less dependent on distance than on the effort 

expended to break out of gravitational pull to get from one point to another. The 

geographical regions of space have been divided into near Earth orbit, extending about 

22,300 miles from the Earth's surface; cislunar space, extending from geosynchronous 

orbit to the Moon's orbit and including the geopolitically important Lagrange libration 

points, discussed below; and translinear space, extending from an orbit beyond the Moon, 

where the gravitational pull of the Sun becomes greater than that of the Earth, to the edge 

of the solar system.9 

As with the Earth, an understanding of the geopolitics of space emerges initially from 

efforts to delineate the physical dimensions of the space environment. We need not 

review in great detail the literature on this important topic. What should be immediately 

obvious, however, is the limited applicability of the national sovereignty concept that 

governs nation-state relationships on Earth. The farther one ventures into space, the more 

difficult it becomes to determine what is above any one point on Earth. States can assert 

exclusive jurisdiction within their airspace because it lies in close proximity to their 

sovereign territory and they are more likely to have the means to enforce their claim to 

exclusive jurisdiction. Of course, this calculation could be changed by the development 

and deployment of capabilities constituting spacepower. The Earth and its atmosphere 

have been likened to the coastal areas of the seas on Earth. The high sea of Earth space is 

accessible only after we are able to break through the Earth's atmosphere or, in the case 

of the high seas, to pass beyond the coastal waters. 

Earth space is the environment in which reconnaissance and navigation satellites 

currently operate. It is the setting in which space-based military systems, including spacebased missile defense, would be deployed. Beyond this segment of space lies the lunar 

region encompassing the Moon's orbit. It is of special importance because it contains the 

Lagrange libration points where the gravitational effects of the Earth and Moon would 

cancel each other out. As Marc Vaucher pointed out in a seminal paper on the geopolitics 

of space, the military and commercial importance of these points is vast.10 They are at the

top of the gravity well of cislunar space, meaning that structures placed there could 

remain permanently in place. Because of the effects of the Sun, however, only two of the 

five Lagrange libration points (L4 and L5) are regarded as stable. 

Finally, as we venture from lunar space, we would enter the solar space that lies beyond 

the Moon's orbit, encompasses the planets and asteroids of the solar system, and exists 

within the gravity well of the Sun. As already noted, the asteroids are feared as objects 

that could eventually collide with the Earth and end life as we know it. Alternatively, 

they could represent the new frontier of space exploration. In this latter case, asteroids 

become the basis for stations in space en route to the Moon or from Earth or Moon to 

other planets. Asteroids are said to acquire geostrategic importance as their potential for 

enhancing space travel increases. 

Realist Theory and Spacepower 
In order to understand its implications for spacepower, realist theory can be examined in 

each of its three major variations. These include classical realist theory as set forth by 

Hans Morgenthau;11 structural realist theory developed by Kenneth Waltz;12 and 

neoclassical realist theory.13 What has made realist theory as a whole such a prominent 

part of the IR theory landscape is its multidimensionality, including hypotheses that can 

be generated at each of the levels of analysis of IR theorizing: the international system, 

the units that comprise the international system, and the behavioral characteristics of the 

units themselves. Among the key variables of realist theory, in addition to power, is the 

concept of competing national interests in a world of anarchy, with states comprising an 

international system that requires them to rely extensively on their own means of survival 

or to join alliances or coalitions with others sharing their interests. Although realist theory 

does not (yet) contain an extensive emphasis on space, it is possible to derive from its 

variants numerous ideas as a basis for further IR theory development. We begin with 

national interest. 

According to classical realist theory, the territorial state pursues national interest, which 

is defined by a variety of factors such as geography, ideology, resources, and capabilities 

based on the need to ensure its survival in a world of anarchy. Because international 

politics is a struggle for power, it can easily be inferred that spacepower is a 

manifestation of such a struggle. With the advent of space technologies, national interest 

now includes space. If international rivalries on Earth are being projected into space, 

theories about how states deal with them on Earth can also be extended into space. 

Because technologically advanced states are heavily dependent on space-based assets, the 

ability to defend or destroy such assets becomes a key national security concern, as in the 

case of the United States. Although states are the current entities that may threaten the 

space capabilities of other states, not-so-distant future challenges may come from terrorist 

groups capable, for example, of launching an electromagnetic pulse attack that would 

destroy or disable vital electronic infrastructures, including telecommunications, 

transportation, and banking and other financial infrastructures, and food production and 

distribution systems.14 Such a threat would arise from a nuclear weapon detonated 80 to 

400 kilometers above the Earth's surface directly over the United States or adjacent to its 

territory. However, those entities best able to safeguard their Earth-bound interests 

through the exploitation of new technologies are also likely to be able to utilize space for 

that purpose. 

Space is a new frontier that will be exploited as part of an inevitable and enduring 

struggle for power. This is the obvious lens through which adherents of the realist theory 

would view space. More than 40 years ago, President John F. Kennedy expressed this 

idea when he declared, "The exploration of space will go ahead, whether we join in it or 

not, and it is one of the great adventures of all time, and no nation which expects to be the 

leader of other nations can expect to stay behind in the race for space."15 In the absence of 

space leadership, states will lose preeminence on Earth. In recognition of this essential 

fact, competition in space began as soon as technologies became feasible. During the 

Cold War, the Soviet Union challenged the United States in space. Such statements are 

fully in keeping with classical realist theory. 
In the 21st century, the United States faces increasing numbers of states whose power and 

prestige will be enhanced by their space programs. Therefore, with the advent of space 

technologies, a new dimension has been added to the national interest concept of realist 

theory. The fact that several states have developed national space programs highlights the 

relevance of realist theory in helping to explain why states acquire those programs. As 

already noted, space has begun to be utilized in support of the national interest. That the 

competition characteristic of terrestrial political relationships would be extended to space 

as soon as technologies for this purpose became feasible is implicit in realist theory. This 

includes the ballistic missiles dating from World War II and satellites that had their 

origins in the national security needs for reconnaissance, surveillance, and 

communications during the Cold War. The U.S.-Soviet competition included an 

increasingly important space component that would only have grown more intense if the 

rivalry had gone on for many more years. The dependence of technologically advanced 

states on space, together with their resulting vulnerability to attack in and from space, 

contributes to the relevance of realist theory to the analysis of space and national security. 

Realist theory also contains the assumption that states rely ultimately on themselves for 

survival in the anarchical world of international politics. As sovereign entities, states 

(more accurately, their decisionmakers) determine for themselves how they will ensure 

their survival based on perceptions of national interest. Central to such theory is 

independence, including capabilities that increase the latitude available to states to help 

themselves to survive without outside assistance. Such theory may describe well the 

problems that entities in space will confront, perhaps only mitigated by vast distances 

separating them from each other and minimizing the contact that is essential for conflict, 

while also rendering impossible substantial levels of outside help. What is assumed in 

realist theory about self-help on Earth may be amply magnified in space if and when its 

colonization moves forward. Nevertheless, the vast distances that separate entities in 

space may drastically limit the possibility of armed conflict, as we have known it on 

Earth, between space-based entities on distant planets or asteroids. Even to begin to 

speculate about such behavior is to demonstrate the great latitude for divergent 

perspectives about conflict and cooperation. 

Because national interest can best be understood within a geographical setting, the 

political dimension of geography is integral to realist theory. It has been noted that IR 

theorizing about spacepower begins with space-related geopolitical analysis that cannot 

be separated from national interest. Realist theory thus provides insights into the basis for 

national space policies. According to realist theory, states that are able to develop vast 

terrestrial capabilities are likely to extend their reach into space as technologies for this 

purpose become available. The private sector becomes a vital source of innovation in the 

most advanced economies. Because developed states, and especially the United States, 

have greater technological capabilities to operate in space, they are likely to favor a 

substantial role for the private sector, together with international regimes that regulate the 

use of space and protect the ability of public and private sector entities to operate there. 

Developing countries that cannot afford to divert resources to space or simply lack such 

capabilities are more likely to favor the extension of the common heritage principle to 

space while attempting to place drastic limits on developed countries and perhaps calling 
for mandatory transfers of space technology to developing countries. Such countries view 

space through a different prism of national interest, seeking to restrict or retard more 

developed states from exercising full control or from maximizing spacepower. Such 

behavior on the part of states large and small with regard to space issues is in keeping 

with realist theory. Each state operates according to perceptions of national interest. 

Structural realist theory offers other insights into future space relationships. According to 

Kenneth Waltz, the international structure shapes the options available to units (in this 

case, states). In particular, the international structure is key to understanding unit-level 

behavior. Structure is defined as the type and number of units and their respective 

capabilities. The type and number of states have changed dramatically over time. New 

technologies have conferred unprecedented capabilities, including interactive capacity, on 

the states comprising the international system. Levels of interdependence have increased 

greatly. The foreign policy options available to states differ between bipolar and 

multipolar international systems. Structure shapes how states align with or against each 

other. We have already begun to consider the structural characteristics of space if we 

assume that the planets and their lunar satellites constitute the principal units. The 

geography of space, including where units are strategically situated, provides an 

important basis for theorizing about their relative importance, first, to states and other 

units on Earth and, eventually, perhaps with each other. The physical sciences, including 

astronomy, have already provided vast knowledge about how these units of the solar 

system relate to each other and to the Sun. IR theories will be enriched as we move into 

space and develop political relationships that become the basis for theorizing about the 

sociopolitical entities that will comprise space-based actors. Earlier, the suggestion was 

made that the unique characteristics of space, including distances and other features, will 

shape interactive patterns within and among space-based political units. Space colonies 

may have to operate with great independence because they cannot rely on a Mother Earth 

that would be possibly light years distant. If such assertions are true, they provide insights 

into how structure, extrapolated from structural realist theory, would shape unit behavior 

in space. Perhaps this would resemble in some ways the extremely limited preindustrial 

interactive capacity on Earth when communications between widely separated groups 

were few and often nonexistent. 

Compared to present terrestrial international structures, space structures are likely to 

remain at a very rudimentary level. As technology develops, however, it is not fanciful to 

anticipate that parts of the solar system will be linked in unprecedented fashion as the 

ability to project spacepower rises, thus giving new meaning to space structure. Like the 

proliferation of capabilities leading to new power centers and globalization on Earth, it is 

possible to envisage such an analogy in space someday. This might include space stations 

or capabilities in space controlled from Earth. It might also encompass space colonization 

and the creation of new interactive capacity and patterns in space such as those that take 

place among Earth-based units. In the absence of colonization from Earth as took place in 

the age of European expansion, structural analogies in outer space are obviously 

premature. 
However, a major theme of this chapter is that space exploration and exploitation will 

create interactive patterns that in themselves become the basis for theory and its testing. 

What constitutes those capabilities and how they are distributed among political units will 

be essential to understanding space structures. This may eventually become another level 

of analysis supplementing the existing levels for understanding the source of unit 

behavior. For example, as already discussed, we have begun to factor space into IR 

theory about power relationships. Space control is held by many to be indispensable to 

power on Earth. The extent to which options available to states at one or more levels are 

shaped by spacepower providing for space control contributes to space as an increasingly 

important level of analysis in itself. According to such theory, spacepower becomes the 

essential basis for Earthpower. If entities are to be dominant on Earth, they must control 

space. If space control shapes the foreign policy options available to states on Earth, then 

such theorizing about space replaces or supplements the international system level as the 

key echelon of analysis if we move beyond the structural realist theory of Kenneth Waltz. 

Structural realist theory attaches great importance to the numbers and types of actors, the 

distribution of capabilities among them, and their interactive capabilities. For example, to 

think about globalization today is to understand the growing importance of 

telecommunications, including the Internet and broadband. Only recently has the Earth 

been wired for instantaneous communications. Interactive capacity translates into greater 

interaction that, in turn, creates systemic relationships leading to higher levels of 

specialization and interdependence. Systems as the outgrowth of structures represent a 

major focal point of IR theory. Astronomers have accumulated great knowledge about the 

behavior of the units comprising the solar system, including how such units relate to each 

other and how they are arranged in the solar system. Our theories about the socialpolitical behavior of such units will evolve as social or political systems. This means that 

space first will affect interactive patterns, as we already see, of Earthly units with each 

other. Subsequently, the space-based interactive patterns that will become the object of 

theorizing are likely to differ dramatically from those on Earth because of factors such as 

vast distances measured in light years. The social-political solar system will remain far 

more primitive in its development than Earthly international systems, barring major 

advances in space technologies. Nevertheless, it is possible to make use of IR theory 

focused on structure and system to speculate about such space relationships. 

Neoclassical realist theory also provides a basis for discussing space-power and IR 

theory. The effort to refine neorealist theory includes an understanding of the conditions 

under which states choose whether competition or cooperation is the preferred option. 

Although its overall power and the place of the state in the international system 

decisively shape actor choices, foreign policy, potentially including spacepower, is the 

result of choices based on perceptions, values, and other domestic-level factors. Thus, the 

neoclassical realist literature brings together international systems and unit-level 

variables based on the assumption that foreign policy is the result of complex patterns of 

interaction within and between both levels. Neoclassical realist theory rethinks power in 

its offensive and defensive components, including the circumstances under which states 

seek security in an anarchic setting by developing military forces to deter or defend 

against an adversary as well as the level and types of capabilities that are deemed 
sufficient to ensure one state's security without threatening the other side's ability to deter 

or defend. Such issues are easily identifiable in discussions about spacepower. 

A variant of neoclassical realist theory, called contingent-realist theory, emphasizes what 

is termed the offense-defense balance, defined as the ratio of the cost of offensive forces 

to the cost of defensive capabilities. Contingent-realist theory provides a theoretical basis 

for examining when and how states, in a self-help system, decide to cooperate as a means 

of resolving the security dilemma. Entirely consistent with such IR theory, space affords 

yet another setting for states to develop cooperative or competitive relationships. To the 

extent that domestic preferences shape the foreign policy of democratic states, we also 

come close to democratic peace theory. Domestic factors help mold foreign policy 

preferences, including support for cooperation or competition. Such neoclassical realist 

thought leads logically to a discussion about, and possible integration of, other IR 

theories into theory about space, including neoliberal and especially democratic peace 

theory. 

Neoliberal Theories and Space 

Just as space can be viewed as an area for competition, so can it also be the basis for 

cooperation. Such an assertion opens for consideration a spectrum of IR theory beyond 

neoclassical realist theory to be applied to our thinking about space. For example, 

democratic peace theory (DPT) posits that states defined as liberal democracies do not go 

to war with other liberal democracies. Such states are more likely to cooperate with each 

other in space activities than they are with totalitarian governments in space or in other 

endeavors—although the United States and the Soviet Union developed cooperative 

relationships with each other during the Cold War. Liberal democracies in disputes with 

other liberal democracies are likely to resolve their disagreements by means other than 

armed conflict. It is primarily in democracies that debates about the militarization and 

weaponization of space take place. Presumably, democracies that provide the basis for 

colonization or other interactive patterns in space would carry with them the values that 

could shape their behavior in space, just as the seeds of American democracy were 

planted by the British colonists who settled in the New World. Could we conceive of the 

colonization of space leading to forms of government pitting democratic colonies against 

those from nondemocratic states on Earth? Such is the logic of DPT extended into space. 

However, it is plausible to suggest that the rigors of space will test Earthly values in 

environments drastically different than those that exist on Earth, necessitating dramatic 

changes in political and social relationships. Such a suggestion is fully in keeping with 

the assumption that environing factors shape the options available to humans, whether on 

Earth or in space, just as humans make concerted efforts to alter the environment to meet 

their needs. The interactive process between humans and their environment has provided 

an enduring focal point for IR theory and other social science theory. 

As they develop a presence in space as an adjunct to their terrestrial interests, 

democracies and other states have already begun to form regimes that codify normative 

standards designed to facilitate cooperation based on agreed procedures and processes as 

well as common interests and shared values about space-related activities. Those regimes 
may be formal or informal. Formal regimes may be the result of legislation by 

international organizations that are themselves established by democracies and other 

states having an interest in such arrangements. Such formal regimes may possess 

governing councils and bureaucratic structures. In contrast, informal regimes may be 

based simply on consensus about objectives and the interests of the participants. 

Therefore, it is possible to envisage regimes in space or on space issues based on a 

convergence of interests in keeping with realist theory or as the outgrowth of the 

cooperative values of democracies. 

The liberal world vision holds that states and their actors engage in mutually rewarding 

exchanges, including trade based on specialization and comparative advantage. 

Cooperation benefits states as well as individuals and groups that become increasingly 

interdependent. Order emerges as self-interested units in an anarchic setting cooperate for 

mutual benefit. In other words, cooperation may be based on national interests, an idea 

that is compatible with realist theory. Liberal theory holds that cooperation in one sector 

may produce satisfaction that enhances incentives to collaborate in additional sectors, 

leading to what Ernst Haas termed "spillover" or the "expansive logic of sector 

integration."16 Just as advances in technology have led to the emergence of a single global 

system and international society, neoliberal theory posits that the extension of man's 

reach into the solar system and ultimately the broader universe will enhance the need for 

cooperation. Both as an expression of the values of a liberal democracy set forth in DPT 

and as a matter of self interest, cooperation becomes an essential part of liberal IR theory 

about space relationships. We do not currently know whether outer space will reinforce 

the competitive dimension or create the need for greater cooperation within and among 

the emerging entities that will populate space. We may hypothesize that the demands of 

life in outer space may enhance the need for cooperation, but we may also consider the 

pursuit of clashing interests between contending groups for control of key space 

geopolitical positions and assets. The answer to such questions, of course, holds 

important implications for the relevance of one IR theory or another to space. At this 

point in time, however, neoliberal theory, like realist theory, has much to offer as we 

speculate about space relationships. 

Constructivism 

Another approach (and a fertile one) to theorizing about space flows from constructivism. 

Whereas much of IR theory usually focuses on relationships among structures that shape 

the behavior of units or agents, and how interactive capacity leads to interactive patterns 

(systems), constructivism views the world in a fundamentally different way. In the 

constructivist image, the building blocks of international society can be best understood 

by analysis of rules, practices, agents, statements, social arrangements, and relationships. 

Constructivism is not a theory, but instead an ontology, an understanding of the nature of 

being, a way of looking at the world. The world is constantly being "constructed" and 

therefore changed as new geopolitical, geoeconomic, or geostrategic changes take place. 

Such changes occur in a setting in which a "vast part of the planet [is] also changing 

'internal' ways of running [its] political, economic, and social affairs. No part of the world 

can avoid these changes or their consequences; the entire world is continuously 'under 
construction.'"17 What this means is that theories based on phenomena such as states, 

balances of power, anarchy, or national interest are inadequate, if not misleading, because 

they are abstractions that are "constructed" in our minds rather than being objects having 

concrete reality. Instead, human relationships are inherently social in that they are defined 

by the social arrangements made by individuals or groups who are endowed with free 

will. What is acceptable in the form of human behavior at one point in time may not be 

acceptable in a subsequent phase. For example, the role of women in Western society has 

been altered dramatically in the past century. Practices that were once commonplace are 

no longer deemed acceptable. People are constantly changing and redefining their 

relationships based on the practices and rules that they create. Therefore, they are free of 

the material inanimate factor termed structure. Translated into IR theory and space, this 

means that we have the ability to create, or construct, the types of arrangements that we 

may wish to have for space. What is important is how we think about and construct "rules 

rather than imaginary, artificially unified entities such as states or structures. Rules have 

ontological substance; they are there for anybody to see."18 

Rules of behavior are the result of a changing intersubjective consensus that arises over 

time from discussions, thought, and action. Just as geopolitics addresses the physical 

environment, constructivism deals with the ideational setting. What we have, according 

to Nicholas Onuf, a leader in constructivist thought, is a continuous "two way process" in 

which "people make society, and society makes people."19 As a result of such interaction, 

we develop rules of behavior within institutions and elsewhere. In other words, we 

construct reality as well as our respective individual, group, and national identities. It is 

not a great leap in logic to consider space as an arena in which rules of behavior, first 

derived from Earthly experience and subsequently evolving in light of new factors, lead 

to the construction of newer rules governing behavior as well as identities. According to 

constructivism, new values and expectations are created that become embedded in

growing numbers of people and spread to broader epistemic communities, defined as 

elites with a shared understanding of a particular subject. Presumably, the organizers of 

this project and its participants fall within this category as they develop an ideational 

basis for thinking about and developing strategies for spacepower. Such epistemic 

communities create a strategy for achieving their goals and play a major innovative role. 

For the constructivist, the essential issue is how such a process will play itself out in 

sectors of importance such as space. Whoever constructs rules of behavior that can be 

applied to space will determine what those rules are, at least to the extent that we are 

dealing with political/ social relationships. 

Conclusion 

This chapter has briefly surveyed four major perspectives or IR theories. Greater depth 

and analysis are required to encompass the more extensive IR theory. This includes 

theories of conflict and war, deterrence and dissuasion, cooperation, integration, and 

political community. To what extent, for example, will the clashes that take place on 

Earth have counterparts in space, and what can conflict theory suggest to us about their 

parameters? By the same token, what can be hypothesized about the forces making for 

greater community and integration, including nationalism and identity, that would have 
direct relevance to space? Although we can only speculate about the answers to such 

questions, IR theory provides a useful point of departure for such an exercise. 

IR theory rests on contending and contrasting assumptions about relationships between 

international units, including states and other actors. Even having far less knowledge of 

space than we have about the Earth, we have already begun to transfer beliefs about 

Earth-bound interactions into our thinking about the behavior of states in space. 

However, space has already become an arena for competition and cooperation. IR theory 

offers alternative explanations about international competition and cooperation. The 

emphasis that we place on competition or cooperation may depend on the IR theory or 

theories on which we choose to rely. This we already do in the case of terrestrial 

international relationships. To the extent that we envisage space as an arena for growing 

competition based on an inevitable quest for power, we will be drawn to realist theory. If 

we emphasize the cooperative dimension, we will likely embrace assumptions derived 

from liberal theory. Because the stakes are immense, how we theorize about space, 

drawing on existing and yet-to-be-developed IR and other social science theories, will 

have major implications for strategies and policies. Because no single IR theory capable 

of describing, explaining, or prescribing political behavior on Earth exists, we cannot 

expect to find otherwise in space. Therefore, it is important to recognize the inherent 

limitations in extrapolating from Earthly IR theory to space, while also drawing wherever 

possible on such theory as we probe farther into space.

Notes

1. Martin Ira Glassner, Political Geography (New York: John Wiley and Sons, Inc., 1993), 519. 

2. Colin S. Gray, "The Influence of Space Power upon History," Comparative Strategy 15, no. 4 

(October–December 1996), 293–308. 

3. Peter L. Hays, United States Military Space: Into the Twenty-first Century (Maxwell Air Force 

Base, AL: Air University Press, 2002). 

4. E.H. Carr, The Twenty Years' Crisis 1919–1939: An Introduction to the Study of International 

Relations (New York: Palgrave, 2001), 4. 

5. Ibid., 6. 

6. Everett C. Dolman, "Geostrategy in the Space Age: An Astropolitical Analysis," in Geopolitics: 

Geography and Strategy, ed. Colin S. Gray and Geoffrey Sloan (London and Portland, OR: Frank 

Cass, 1999), 83. 

7. Everett C. Dolman, Astropolitik: Classical Geopolitics in the Space Age (London and Portland, 

OR: Frank Cass, 2002), 1. 

8. Harold and Margaret Sprout, The Ecological Perspective on Human Affairs with Special 

Reference to International Politics (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1965), 27. 

9. Marc E. Vaucher, "Geographical Parameters for Military Doctrine in Space and the Defense of the 

Space-Based Enterprise," in International Security Dimensions of Space, ed. Uri Ra'anan and 

Robert L. Pfaltzgraff, Jr. (Hamden, CT: Archon Books, 1984), 34. 

10. Ibid., 32–46. 

11. See especially Hans Morgenthau, Politics among Nations: The Struggle for Power and Peace 

(New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1960), 3–15. 

12. Kenneth M. Waltz, Theory of International Politics (Reading, MA: Addison-Wesley, 1979). 
13. See, for example, Gideon Rose, "Neoclassical Realism and Theories of Foreign Policy," World 

Politics (October 1998), 144–172. See also Fareed Zakaria, "Realism and Domestic Politics," 

International Security 17, no. 1 (Summer 1997), 162–183; Charles L. Glaser, "Realists as 

Optimists: Cooperation as Self-Help," International Security 19, no. 3 (Winter 1994/1995), 50–90. 

14. This type of threat is described and discussed in the Report of the Commission to Assess the Threat 

to the United States from Electromagnetic Pulse (EMP) Attack, vol. 1, Executive Report (2004). 

15. John F. Kennedy, address at Rice University on the Nation's Space Effort, Houston, Texas, 

September 12, 1962, available at 

<www.jfklibrary.org/Historical+Resources/Archives/Reference+Desk/Speeches/JFK/003POF03S

paceEffort09121962.htm>. 

16. Ernst Haas, Beyond the Nation-State (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1964), 48. 

17. Vendulka Kubalokova, Nicholas Onuf, and Paul Kowert, eds., International Relations in a 

Constructed World (Armonk, NY: M.E. Sharpe, 1998). 

18. Ibid., xii. 

19. Nicholas Onuf, "Constructivism: A User's Manual," in International Relations in a Constructed 

World, 59. 
Chapter 4:

Real Constraints on Spacepower

Martin E.B. France and Jerry Jon Sellers

Any discussion of the bases and tenets of spacepower must begin with a solid 

understanding of the governing physical laws, environment, advantages, and difficulties 

inherent in space systems and their operations.1 While conferring significant advantages 

on those who can operate there effectively, space presents unique challenges and high 

development costs, both monetarily and experientially. After all, it is rocket science. 

Beyond the equations, too, there exist the complex systems definition and engineering 

needed to "operationalize" space and bring its effects to the user in a timely and 

affordable fashion. From definition of the basic need to delivery of a given capability, the 

variety of technical, programmatic, and acceptable risk issues that must be defined before 

any spacepower can be sustained or developed is daunting. Theorists and users must 

realize that, even on the strategic level, there are irreducible sets of knowledge, 

understanding, and trades that form the foundation of space competency. The purpose of 

this chapter is to highlight these key concepts, serving as a review for some readers, an 

overview for others, and (we hope) a motivation for all to continue to hone their space 

expertise. 

Advantages of Space 

Getting into space is dangerous and expensive. So why bother? The five primary 

advantages space offers for modern society are: 

• global perspective 

• clear view of the heavens 

• free-fall environment 

• abundant resources 

• unique challenge as the final frontier. 

While each of these benefits plays a role in defining a nation's space-power, they may not 

be equally valued. 

Clearly, the global perspective provided by space is a primary motivator for deploying 

commercial, civil, military, and scientific systems there. Space takes the quest for greater 

perspective to its ultimate end, allowing access to large areas of the Earth's surface 

depending upon orbital specifics. Orbiting spacecraft can thus serve as "eyes and ears in 

the sky" to provide a variety of useful services. 

The high ground, once achieved, makes possible several other capabilities that may 

reinforce a nation's space and economic power. Scientifically, space offers a clear view of 
the heavens. From the Earth's surface, the atmosphere blurs, blocks, and disturbs 

(scintillates) visible light and other electromagnetic radiation, frustrating astronomers 

who need access to all the regions of the electromagnetic spectrum to explore the 

universe. Spacecraft such as the Hubble Space Telescope and the Gamma Ray 

Observatory overcome this restriction and have revolutionized our understanding of the 

cosmos. 

Space offers a free-fall environment enabling manufacturing processes not possible on 

the Earth's surface. Though certainly not exploited to date for other than experimental 

value, the potential to manufacture exotic compounds for computer components or 

pharmaceutical products exists. 

Further downstream, space offers abundant resources. While spacecraft now use only one 

of these abundant resources—solar energy—the bounty of the solar system offers an 

untapped reserve of minerals and energy to sustain future exploration and colonization. In 

the not-too-distant future, lunar resources, or even those from the asteroids, might fuel a 

growing space-based economy. 

Finally, space serves simply as a frontier. The human condition has always improved as 

new frontiers were challenged. As a stimulus for technological advances and a crucible 

for creating economic expansion, space offers a limitless challenge that compels national 

and global attention. The act of exploration—across oceans or prairies in the past, and in 

this case pushing back the frontiers of space—has long been a wellspring of pride and an 

expression of power. 

Turning Need into Capability 

From an engineer's perspective, spacepower can be viewed as the exploitation of spacebased systems (and the natural laws governing them) to achieve national political or 

economic ends. Maintaining and expanding a nation's spacepower hinges on the ability to 

define the need for new systems and turn those needs into capabilities that policymakers 

and war-fighters can exploit. The purpose of the space systems acquisition process is to 

translate those needs into capable systems. The technical foundation of space systems 

acquisition is systems engineering. Fundamentally, the space systems engineering 

process leverages one or more of the advantages of space outlined above to turn needs, as 

defined by policymakers and warfighters, into operational capabilities. The more clearly 

the needs for these systems are articulated in terms of performance, cost, and schedule 

goals, the better systems engineers can make realistic tradeoffs to achieve those goals 

with acceptable risk. 

Ultimately, the intended goals and objectives of the system become defined in terms of 

requirements—single, testable shall statements that define what the system will be or 

shall do and how well. Bounding the universe of possible solutions for any problem are 

constraints. The difference between a requirement and a constraint is really a matter of 

perspective. One person's requirement for a given mechanical interface as defined by a 

specific bolt pattern becomes a constraint from the standpoint of the designer of the 
interface plate. Some requirements are imposed on a system for practical, political, or 

economic reasons and are arguably negotiable at some pay grade, while some constraints, 

such as the laws of physics or the real state of the art, are not subject to negotiation. The 

remainder of this chapter will focus on understanding the source of requirements and 

constraints on space systems—and thus ultimately on spacepower—that form the realm 

of the possible. Fortunately, this realm is vast, offering many asyet-untapped capabilities. 

But the better we understand the limits of this realm, the better we will manage scarce 

resources to achieve best systems— and hence capabilities—to enhance spacepower. 

Mission Architectures 

The increasing complexity and interoperability of space systems have lead to discussions 

of "systems of systems" or, more broadly, mission architectures. A space mission 

architecture includes all of the space and ground elements needed to make the mission 

successful. A mission architecture includes the spacecraft (including payload and bus), 

operating in a specific orbit, interacting with some subject (see figure 4–1). The 

spacecraft is placed into orbit by a launch vehicle and is operated using a defined 

communication architecture that uses ground stations and operators. At the heart of the 

architecture are the objectives, requirements, and other factors that define the mission 

concept.

Figure 4–1. Mission Architechture
Defining Requirements, Understanding Constraints 

As stated earlier, the need desired by the policymaker or warfighter must eventually be 

articulated as a set of design-to, build-to, and test-to requirements by the systems 

engineer during the acquisition process. If we consider only technical requirements (the 

focus of this chapter), we can divide these requirements into a number of basic categories 

(similar to those specified by Military Standard-961c, "Preparation of Military 

Specifications and Associated Documents"). Within these broad categories, we can 

further define a number of typical requirements identified for military missions. These 

requirements are in turn specified by some number of detailed performance parameters. 

Finally, these parameters are constrained by a number of factors (see table 4–1). The 

point of this exercise is to distill the broad operational requirements normally levied on 

space systems down to a handful of constraining factors that affect them. The reader will 

notice a number of recurring themes that affect myriad types of requirements—for 

example, orbital mechanics. The balance of this chapter will explore these constraining 

factors to understand the possibilities and limits they pose on spacepower capabilities. 

Table 4–1. Space Mission and Constraints

Orbital Mechanics 

Simply put, an orbit is achieved when an object is moving fast enough that the Earth's 

curved surface is falling away from it faster than the object itself is pulled to the Earth by 

gravity. The velocity of the object (or spacecraft, for our purposes) and its position 

relative to the Earth define the specific orbit in which it moves. At ground level, an object 

would need a velocity of approximately 7.9 kilometers (km) per second (tangent to the 

Earth's surface) to effectively "fall" around the Earth—neglecting aerodynamic drag, of 

course. This motion is governed by Newton's second law of motion and law of 

gravitation and assumes that the spacecraft acts as a constant point mass, its mass is 

insignificant relative to the Earth's, the Earth is a perfect sphere, and no other forces 

(drag, thrust, solar, or lunar gravity, and so forth) are acting upon our spacecraft. These 

assumptions represent the requirements for the "restricted two-body problem," for which 

Newton's solution describes the spacecraft's location using two constants and a polar 

angle and represents a general relationship for any conic section (circle, ellipse, parabola, 

or hyperbola). 

Describing Orbits 

For the most useful case in this study, we consider the elliptical Earth orbit defined by the 

parameters shown in figure 4–2.

Figure 4–2. Elliptical Orbit Parameters
With no other forces acting upon the satellite, both total mechanical energy and angular 

momentum of the spacecraft remain constant throughout its orbit—consistent with 

Newton's laws of motion and the fact that gravity is a conservative force field. While in 

elliptical orbit, then, the satellite is constantly exchanging potential energy and kinetic 

energy, moving from apogee to perigee and back. At apogee—the highest point in an 

orbit—the satellite is moving slowest, while at perigee, the lowest point, it is moving 

fastest. 

Operational orbits can be described in terms of six classical orbital elements (COEs) that 

describe their physical properties (see figure 4–3): 

• semimajor axis, a (orbital size)

• eccentricity, e (orbital shape) 

• inclination, I (orientation of the orbital plane with respect to the equatorial plane) 

• right ascension of the ascending node, Ω (orientation of the orbital plane with 

respect to the Earth-centered reference frame)

• argument of perigee, ω (orientation of the orbit within its orbital plane)

• true anomaly, n (spacecraft's location in its orbit). 

Note in the figure that all elliptical orbits must cross (or contain) the equatorial plane and 

have the center of the Earth at one focus of the orbital ellipse.2 It is not possible to have a 
natural orbit that forms a "halo" above the Earth's pole or that appears motionless 

("hovering") over any spot not on the equator.

Figure 4–3. Classical Orbital Elements for Earth Orbits

Earth-orbiting space missions supporting civil, commercial, and military objectives 

generally fall into one of four categories: communications, remote sensing, navigation 

and timing, and scientific. The previously presented physical laws governing spacecraft 

motion form the realm of the possible for which specific mission requirements can be 

met. The orbit's size, shape, and orientation determine whether the spacecraft payload can 

observe its target subjects and carry out other mission objectives. The orbit's size (height) 

determines how much of the Earth's surface the spacecraft's instruments can see, as well 

as how often it might pass overhead. Naturally, the higher the orbit, the more the total 

area that can be seen at once. But just as our eyes are limited in how much of a scene we 

can see without moving them or turning our head, a spacecraft payload has similar 

limitations. We define the payload's field of view as the cone of visibility for a particular 

sensor (see figure 4–4). Depending on the sensor's field of view and the height of its 

orbit, a specific total area on the Earth's surface is visible at any one time, with the linear 

width or diameter of this area defined as the swath width. Some missions require 

continuous coverage of a point on Earth or the ability to communicate simultaneously 

with every point on Earth. When this happens, a single spacecraft may not be able to 

satisfy the mission need, requiring a constellation of identical spacecraft placed in 

different (but often similar) orbits to provide the necessary coverage. The global 

positioning system (GPS) mission requirement, for example, requires a constellation of 

satellites because the mission requirements call for every point on Earth to be in view of 
at least four GPS satellites at any one time—an impossibility with only four satellites at 

any altitude. 

Figure 4–4. Satellite Field of View

Figure 4–5 and table 4–2 show various types of missions and their typical orbits. A 

geostationary orbit is a circular orbit with a period of about 24 hours and inclination of 

0°. Geostationary orbits are particularly useful for communications satellites because a 

spacecraft in this orbit appears motionless to an Earth-based observer, such as a fixed 

ground station. Geosynchronous orbits are inclined orbits with a period of about 24 

hours. Ground-based observers above about 70° latitude (north or south) cannot see a 

satellite at geostationary altitude as it is actually below the horizon. A semisynchronous 

orbit (used by the GPS constellation) has a period of 12 hours. Sun-synchronous orbits 

are retrograde (westbound) low Earth orbits (LEOs) typically inclined 95° to 105° and 

most often used for remote sensing missions because they pass over locations on Earth 

with the same Sun angle each time. A Molniya orbit is a semisynchronous, eccentric orbit 

used for missions requiring coverage of high latitudes, those that cannot access a 

geostationary orbit as described above.

Figure 4–5. Types of Orbits and Their Inclinations
Table 4–2. Satellite Missions and Orbits
Spacecraft users often need to know what part of Earth their spacecraft is overlying at 

any given time. For instance, remote sensing satellites must be over precise locations to 

get the coverage they need. A spacecraft's ground track is a trace of the spacecraft's path 

over the Earth's surface while the Earth rotates beneath the satellite on its axis. Ground 

tracks are presented to the user on a flat (Mercator) projection of the Earth (see figure 4–

6).

Figure 4–6. Satellite Ground Tracks
The impact of variation in orbital elements such as semi-major axis, inclination, and 

argument of perigee is shown in figures 4–7, 4–8, and 4–9.3 

Figure 4–7. Orbital Ground Tracks with Different Periods

Figure 4–8. Orbital Ground Tracks with Different Inclinations
Figure 4–9. Orbital Ground Tracks with Different Perigee Locations

Maneuvers and Rendezvous 
The ability to maintain a desired orbit and orientation within that orbit, to maneuver to 

possibly more useful orbits, or to rendezvous with other objects in space can be critical to 

overall space capability and survivability. Once a spacecraft achieves its assigned, 

desired orbit, it seldom remains there. Most space missions require changes to one or 

more of the classic orbital elements at least once. Geosynchronous satellites, for example, 

are sometimes first launched into a low perigee (~300 km) "parking orbit" due to launch 

vehicle limitations before transferring to their final orbit, requiring a large change in 

semi-major axis as well as shifting the satellite's inclination from that of the parking orbit 

to 0°. After achieving their desired mission orbit, many satellites regularly make small 

adjustments to compensate for small perturbations (for example, drag, solar wind, 

gravitational variations) to stay in that orbit. Spacecraft may also need to perform 

maneuvers to rendezvous with other spacecraft, as when the space shuttle maneuvers to 

dock with the International Space Station. The ability to maneuver in space differentiates 

more capable space systems from simpler buoy-like satellites with limited operational 

flexibility—but these extra capabilities come at some cost. 

Spacecraft maneuvers, beyond simple adjustments to maintain a current orbit, can be 

classified as in-plane, out-of-plane, and combined, referring to the orbital plane into 

which the maneuver is executed. In-plane maneuvers primarily affect the semi-major axis 

of an orbit, enlarging or reducing the "size" of the orbit and therefore increasing or 

decreasing the orbit period. In either case, the spacecraft expends energy—usually in the 

form of burned rocket propellant. Generally, this change in energy takes the form of a 

change in velocity (ΔV) executed tangentially to the satellite's flight path. The most well 

known of these maneuvers, the Hohmann transfer, is a combination of two such "burns" 

that moves a satellite from one circular orbit to another using minimum energy (see 

figure 4–10).

Figure 4–10. Hohmann Transfer
For the case where a satellite is moved from a lower to a higher orbit, the first burn (all 

burns are assumed to be impulsive) moves the satellite from the initial orbit to the point 

of perigee in the transfer orbit. The transfer ellipse's semi-major axis is the average of the 

semi-major axes of the initial and target circular orbits, and the ΔV needed to accomplish 

this first phase is the difference in the velocity at that point between the circular and 

elliptical orbits. Once the satellite reaches apogee of the transfer orbit, another burn is 

required to circularize its path into the final orbit. Again, this ΔV will be the difference 

between the velocity of the two orbits (transfer and final) at that point, and the total ΔV

required for the mission is the sum of these two burns.4 

Operationally, relatively small in-plane adjustments can change overhead passage time of 

LEO satellites by changing orbital period, can be used for collision avoidance, or can 

extend the on-orbit life of a LEO satellite whose orbit has slowly degraded due to 

atmospheric drag. Conversely, maneuvers can accelerate reentry by dropping the perigee 

of a satellite into a region where atmospheric drag increases, park an unused or nearly 

dead satellite into a safe orbit away from other operational systems, or initiate rendezvous 

with another spacecraft. 

On-orbit rendezvous or interception maneuvers fall into two general categories: co-planar 

and co-orbital. In the former, a Hohmann transfer approach combines with appropriate 

phasing in order to time the burns correctly. The initial phase angle between the 
interceptor and target as well as the different speeds of each spacecraft in its particular 

orbit determines timing of the maneuver (see figures 4–11 and 4–12). 

Figure 4–11. Coplanar Rendezvous

Figure 4–12. Co-orbital Rendezvous
Co-orbital rendezvous occurs when both the target and interceptor are in the same orbit, 

though at different positions (true anomaly). In this case, the interceptor must maneuver 

into a phasing orbit, "speeding up to slow down" (or the converse) in order to meet the 

target after completing one phasing orbit. In both cases (co-planar and co-orbital), the 

interceptor must burn again at rendezvous to maintain its position near the target and not 

remain in its intercept or phasing transfer orbit.5 

Out-of-plane maneuvers, or plane changes, occur when the satellite's direction of motion 

changes—usually by a nontangential burn. Operationally, plane changes to adjust the 

inclination of an orbit (see figure 4–13) are most commonly used when satellites 

launched into parking orbits from nonequatorial launch sites maneuver into geostationary 

orbits (a = 42,160 km, i = 0°). The plane change itself often combines with the apogee

burn that circularizes the satellite's orbit at that altitude. For satellites in high inclination 

orbits (such as polar or Sun-synchronous), plane changes executed over one of the poles 

change the right ascension of the ascending node for the orbit (see figure 4–14), thus 

altering the overhead passage time and sun angle for that satellite. Since the burn is 

performed perpendicular to the spacecraft's flight path, the magnitudes of the spacecraft's 

initial and final velocities are identical.

Figure 4–13. Simple Inclination Plane Change
Figure 4–14. Simple Plane Change
Orbit Perturbations 

If some of the original simplifying assumptions for orbits are changed to include a more 

complete view of the forces acting on a spacecraft, COEs other than just the true anomaly 

will begin to change over time. The primary perturbations to simplified, classical orbital 

motion are: 

• atmospheric drag 

• Earth's oblateness (or nonsphericity in general) 

• solar radiation pressure 

• third-body gravitational effects (Moon, Sun, planets, and so forth) 

• unexpected thrusting—caused by either outgassing or malfunctioning thrusters; 

can perturb orbits or cause spacecraft rotation. 

While the Earth's atmosphere gets thinner with altitude, it still has some effect as high as 

600 km. Because many important space missions occur in orbits below this altitude, this 

very thin air causes drag on these spacecraft, taking energy away from the orbit in the 

form of friction on the spacecraft. Because orbital energy is a function of semi-major 

axis, the semi-major axis will decrease over time. For noncircular orbits, the eccentricity 

also decreases since the drag at lower altitudes (near perigee) is higher than at apogee 

(see figure 4–15).

Figure 4–15. Effects of Drag on Eccentric Low Earth Orbit
Factors such as the Earth's day-night cycle, seasonal tilt, variable solar distance, and 

fluctuating magnetic field, as well as the Sun's 27-day rotation and 11-year cycle for 

sunspots, make precise real-time drag modeling nearly impossible. Further complicating 

the modeling problem is the fact that the force of drag also depends on the spacecraft's 

coefficient of drag and frontal area, which can vary widely depending upon spacecraft 

orientation. 

In addition, the Earth is not a perfect sphere, affecting the earlier point mass assumption. 

The most pronounced nonspheroidal characteristic is oblateness, meaning that the Earth 

bulges at the equator and is somewhat flattened at the poles, modeled using the constant 

J2. Unlike drag, which is a nonconservative force, the J2 effect is gravitational and does 

not change a spacecraft's total mechanical energy (that is, constant semi-major axis). 

Instead, J2 acts as a torque on the orbit since the Earth's gravitational pull is no longer 

directed from the Earth's exact center, causing the right ascension of the ascending node 

(RAAN, or Ω) to shift or precess with each orbit6 and the perigee to rotate through an 

elliptical orbit. J2 effect is a function of orbit inclination and altitude as shown in figures 

4–16 and 4–17 describing its effect on RAAN and argument of perigee.7 

Figure 4–16. Perigee Rotation Rate
Figure 4–17. Nodal Regression Rate

Other, smaller perturbing forces also affect a spacecraft's orbit and its orientation within 

it, including solar radiation pressure, third-body gravitational effects (Moon, Sun, planets, 

and so forth), and unexpected thrusting—caused by either outgassing or malfunctioning 

thrusters. The importance of each perturbation is a function of the spacecraft's mission 

and need for orbital and attitude accuracy. 

Space Launch and Rocket Propulsion 

For most space missions, the spacecraft must be placed into a specific orbit, requiring a 

launch at a particular time and in a specific direction. A "launch window" is a period 

when a spacecraft can be launched directly into its initial orbit from a given launch site, 

and it corresponds to the time when the chosen orbit passes over the launch site. In 

practice, a launch window normally covers several minutes or even hours around this 

exact time since mission planners have some flexibility in the orbital elements they can 

accept, and launch vehicles usually can steer enough to expand the length of the window 

somewhat. However, to launch directly into an orbit, the launch site and orbital plane 

must intersect at least once per day. Physically, that means that the inclination of the 
desired orbit must be equal to or greater than the latitude of the launch site. If the two are 

equal, then there will be one launch opportunity per day. If the inclination is greater than 

the latitude, there will be two potential opportunities since, in this case, the spacecraft 

may be launched toward either the ascending or descending node (see figure 4–18). 

However, due to practical restrictions at a given launch site, only one of these 

opportunities may be used. For example, launches from Cape Canaveral are restricted to 

the east and northeast only due to overflight considerations.

Figure 4–18. Launch Windows

During liftoff, a launch vehicle goes through four distinct phases from the launch pad into 

orbit (see figure 4–19). During vertical ascent, the vehicle gains altitude quickly to escape 

the dense, high-drag lower atmosphere. The vehicle then executes a slow pitch maneuver 

to gain velocity downrange (horizontally), followed by a turn in which gravity pulls the 

launch vehicle's trajectory toward horizontal. In the final vacuum phase, the launch 

vehicle is effectively out of the Earth's atmosphere and continues accelerating to gain the 

necessary velocity to achieve orbit. The vehicle's on-board flight control system works to 

deliver the vehicle to the desired burnout conditions: velocity, altitude, and flight-path 

angle. The velocity needed to get to orbit consists of the launch vehicle's burnout velocity 

and the tangential velocity that exists at its launch site due to the Earth's rotation. 

Figure 4–19. Phases of Launch Vehicle Ascent
The closer a launch site is to the equator, the greater the velocity assist provided to the 

launch vehicle from the Earth's rotation when launching eastward.8 A given launch 

vehicle can launch a larger payload due east from a launch site at a lower latitude. For 

westerly launches into retrograde orbits, this same tangential velocity reduces launch 

capability. 

Determining the total velocity needed to launch a spacecraft is a very complex problem 

requiring numerical integration in sophisticated trajectory modeling programs that 

incorporate launch vehicle properties, atmospheric density models, and other factors. To 

determine the overall design velocity, the mission designer must consider velocity needed 

to overcome gravity and reach the correct altitude, inertial velocity needed at burnout for 

the desired orbit, velocity of the launch pad due to Earth's rotation, and velocity losses 

due to air drag, back pressure, and steering losses. The difference between the launch 

vehicle's actual design velocity for a specific payload mass and the design velocity is the 

launch margin. 

Rocket propulsion is responsible for not only launching spacecraft into orbit, but also 

maneuvering them once they are in space and adjusting their attitude to accomplish their 

mission as needed (see table 4–3). While there are many forms of rocket propulsion, they 

all depend upon Newton's laws to apply forces (thrust) or moments (torque). Rockets 

operate by expelling high-speed exhaust in one direction, causing the spacecraft to 

accelerate in another. The only types of rockets currently in use are thermodynamic and 

electrodynamic. Thermodynamic rockets rely on heat and pressure to accelerate a 
propellant (for example, the chemical reaction of fuel and oxidizer burning, or the heat 

generated by electrical heating or a nuclear reaction) using converging/diverging nozzles 

to convert the thermal energy to kinetic energy. Examples of thermodynamic rockets 

include chemical (liquid, solid, and hybrid); nuclear-thermal; solar-thermal; and electrothermal. Electrodynamic rockets use electric and/or magnetic fields to accelerate charged 

particles to high velocities and include ion or electrostatic, Hall effect, and pulsed plasma 

thrusters.

Table 4–3. Rocket Propulsion Types and Performance Comparison

In all cases, the efficiency of a rocket is measured in terms of specific impulse (Isp). 

Specific impulse gives us an effective "miles per gallon" rating as it relates the amount of 

thrust produced for a given weight flow rate of the propellant. Higher Isp rockets produce 

more total ΔV for the same amount of propellant than low Irockets. However, high 

Irockets (such as ion thrusters) are typically low thrust and not suited for some uses. The 

Rocket Equation9 relates the initial and final masses of a spacecraft with the specific 

impulse of the propulsion system to determine the total ΔV available. It is the mission 

designer's job to determine a space mission's many propulsion needs and select the 

appropriate system for each phase. 

The total cost of a specific spacecraft's on-board propulsion system includes several 

factors, in addition to the bottom-line price tag, before making a final selection.10 These 

factors include mass performance (measured by Isp), volume required, time (how fast it 

completes the needed ΔV), power requirements, safety costs (how safe the system and its 

propellant are and how difficult it is to protect people working with the system), logistics 

(system and propellant transport to launch), integration cost with other spacecraft 

subsystems, and technical risk (what flight experience does it have or how did it perform 

in testing). Different mission planners naturally place a higher value on some of these 

factors than on others. A complex commercial mission may place high priority on 

reducing technical risk—for example, a new type of plasma rocket, even if it offers lower 

mass cost, may be too risky when all other factors are considered. 

A basic understanding of rocket propulsion informs mission planners and space experts 

who next consider one of the most obvious manifestations of spacepower—space launch 

systems. While more widely open international access to launch has provided some level 

of space presence and power to dozens of nations, a space launch capability defines a 

unique level of spacepower and is possessed by many fewer states. Requirements for an 

operational launch system are technical, geographic, and financial. Development of a new 

space launch system consumes hundreds of millions to many billions of dollars11 and 

requires broad expertise in propulsion systems, avionics, logistics, manufacturing, and 

integration processes. Testing during system development also requires extensive 

infrastructure and range facilities (often consisting of thousands of square miles of 

controlled airspace) that can assure public safety, while operational launch facilities must 

also include payload processing and mission control centers. 

The physical, financial, and technical difficulties of launch are evident in the relatively 

small number of launch vehicles developed in the world's 50 years of space launch 

experience. Contrasted with the first 50 years of powered atmospheric flight, today's 

launch vehicles represent relatively small advances in capability from the Russian and 

American boosters of the late 1950s and early 1960s that trace their development to 

intercontinental ballistic missiles of the Cold War. All based on chemical (liquid and/or 

solid) propulsion, today's boosters can lift little more than 4 percent of their lift-off mass 

to LEO and much less than half that amount to geosynchronous transfer orbit from which 

a final apogee burn can place a spacecraft into a geostationary orbit. All vehicles use a 
minimum of two stages to achieve orbit (and some as many as four) with costs on the 

order of $10,000 per pound to LEO and $12,000 per pound to geostationary orbit. 

Several attempts to incrementally or drastically reduce launch costs and improve 

responsiveness have not significantly altered the status quo. The space shuttle, originally 

intended as a "space truck" to access space routinely and cheaply, suffered from its 

immense complexity, resulting in enormous per-launch cost growth. After completing its 

support of the International Space Station construction in 2010, it will be retired, largely 

due to safety and high cost of ownership. Small launch vehicles such as Orbital Sciences' 

Pegasus air-launched vehicle (~$22 million per launch for about 500 kilograms [kg] to 

LEO) have served niche markets without reducing overall costs, as have refurbished 

Russian and American intercontinental ballistic missiles (for example, Minotaur). 

SpaceX's Falcon 1 (with an advertised cost of roughly $6 million per launch as of this 

writing) and the larger follow-on Falcon 9 may achieve some cost savings, but nothing 

near the order of magnitude or greater savings that might transform space access to a 

more aviation-like paradigm. More exotic attempts to change the launch industry—such 

as the NASA-funded/Lockheed Martin–developed VentureStar single-stage-to-orbit, 

fully reusable launch vehicle—have not been successful beyond the PowerPoint slide.12 In 

fact, current technology makes it very difficult to reduce space launch costs or turnaround 

time for launch vehicles or to build cost-effective reusable launch systems. With no new 

rocket propulsion technologies for space launch available in the foreseeable future, 

savings in launch costs and processing time will be incremental and depend on gains in 

reliability, manufacturing techniques, and miniaturization of payloads. 

Whatever the state of launch, mission planners and space experts considering launch 

systems must consider the following factors: 

• performance capability (whether the launch vehicle can take the desired mass to 

the mission orbit) 

• vehicle availability (whether the vehicle will be available and ready to launch 

when needed) 

• spacecraft compatibility (whether the payload will fit in the launch vehicle fairing 

and survive the launch environment imposed by the launch vehicle) cost. 

Space Environment 

Once in space, the unique environment presents several challenges to mission 

accomplishment, affecting not only spacecraft but also the signals received and 

transmitted in the course of that mission. The primary space environmental challenges 

are: 

• free-fall gravitational conditions 

• atmospheric effects 

• vacuum 

• collision hazards 

• radiation and charged particles. 
The free-fall environment gives rise to problems with fluid manage-ment—measuring 

and pumping—typically related to on-board liquid propulsion systems. For manned 

spaceflight, the physiological issues can be quite severe, marked by fluid shift within the 

body (lower body edema), altered vestibular function (motion sickness), and reduced load 

on weight-bearing tissues resulting in bone decalcification and muscle tissue loss. 

In addition to the effect of drag on spacecraft (mentioned earlier as a perturbation), the 

upper reaches of the atmosphere contain atomic oxygen caused when radiation splits 

molecular oxygen (O2). Much more reactive than O2, atomic oxygen can cause significant 

degradation of spacecraft materials, weakening components, changing thermal 

characteristics, and degrading sensor performance. 

The vacuum of space creates three potential problems for spacecraft: outgassing, cold 

welding, and heat transfer. Outgassing occurs when materials, such as plastics or 

composites, release trapped gasses (volatiles) upon exposure to vacuum—particularly 

problematic if the released molecules coat delicate sensors, such as lenses, or cause 

electronic components to arc, damaging them. Prior to launch, spacecraft are usually 

tested in a thermal-vacuum chamber to reduce or eliminate potential outgassing sources. 

Cold welding occurs between mechanical parts having very little separation between 

them. After launch, with the small cushion of air molecules between components 

eliminated, parts may effectively "weld" together. The potential for cold welding can be 

mitigated by avoiding the use of moving parts or by using lubricants carefully selected to 

avoid evaporation or outgassing. Heat transfer via conduction, convection, and especially 

radiation may also complicate spacecraft operation—for example, causing temperatures 

to drop below acceptable operating levels—and must be considered in any spacecraft 

design. 

The chances that a spacecraft will be hit by very small pieces of debris (natural or 

manmade) grow with each new space mission. Twenty thousand tons of natural 

materials—dust, meteoroids, asteroids, and comets— hit Earth every year, and estimates 

of the amount of manmade space debris approach 2,200 tons.13 Air Force Space 

Command, headquartered in Colorado Springs, Colorado, uses a worldwide network of 

radar and optical telescopes to track more than 13,000 baseball-sized and larger objects in 

Earth orbit, and some estimate that at least 40,000 golf ball–sized pieces (too small for 

the Air Force to track) are also in orbit,14 not including smaller pieces such as paint flakes 

and slivers of metal. 

The energy of (and thus potential damage caused by) even a very small piece of debris 

hitting a spacecraft at relative speeds of up to 15 km per second makes the debris 

environment in Earth orbit a serious issue.15 For a spacecraft with a cross-sectional area of 

50 to 200 square meters at an altitude of 300 km (typical for space shuttle missions), the 

chance of getting hit by an object larger than a baseball during a year in orbit is about 1 in 

100,000 or less.16 The chance of getting hit by something only 1 millimeter or less in 

diameter, however, is about 100 times more likely, or about 1 in 1,000 during a year in 

orbit. The collision between two medium-sized spacecraft would result in an enormous 

amount of high-velocity debris, and the resulting cloud would expand as it orbited, 
greatly increasing the likelihood of impacting another spacecraft. The domino effect 

could ruin an important orbital band for decades. 

Electromagnetic (EM) radiation from the Sun, while primarily in the visible and nearinfrared parts of the EM spectrum, also contains significant higher energy radiation, such 

as X-rays and gamma rays. While solar cells generate needed electrical power from this 

radiation, spacecraft and astronauts well above the atmosphere face negative 

consequences from it depending on the wavelength of the radiation. The Sun's radiation 

heats exposed surfaces, which can degrade or damage surfaces and electronic 

components, and the resulting solar pressure can perturb orbits. Prolonged exposure to 

ultraviolet radiation degrades spacecraft coatings and is especially harmful to solar cells, 

reducing their efficiency and possibly limiting the useful life of the spacecraft they 

power. In addition, during intense solar flares, bursts of energy in the radio region of the 

spectrum can interfere with onboard communications equipment. Solar radiation 

pressure, though only 5 Newtons of force for 1 square kilometer of surface, can also 

disturb spacecraft orientation. 

Perhaps the most dangerous aspect of the space environment is the pervasive influence of 

charged particles caused by solar activity and galactic cosmic rays. The Sun expels a 

stream of charged particles (protons and electrons) at a rate of 109 kg per second as part of 

the solar wind. During intense solar flares, the number of particles ejected can increase 

dramatically. Galactic cosmic rays are similar to those found in the solar wind or in solar 

flares, but they originate outside of the solar system—the solar wind from distant stars 

and remnants of exploded stars—and are much more energetic than solar radiation. 

The solar wind's charged particles and cosmic particles form streams that hit the Earth's 

magnetic field. The point of contact between the solar wind and the magnetic field is the 

shock front or bow shock. Inside the shock front, the point of contact between the 

charged particles of the solar wind and the magnetic field lines is the magnetopause, and 

the area directly behind the Earth is the magnetotail (see figure 4–20). In the 

electromagnetic spectrum, many lower energy solar particles are deflected by the Earth's 

magnetic field, while some high-energy particles may become trapped and concentrated 

between field lines, forming the Van Allen radiation belts. Additionally, high-energy 

gamma and X-rays may ionize particles in the upper atmosphere that also populate the 

Van Allen belts.

Figure 4–20. Interaction between Solar Wind and Earth's Magnetic Field
Whether charged particles come directly from the solar wind, indirectly from the Van 

Allen belts, or from the other side of the galaxy, they can harm spacecraft in four ways: 

charging, sputtering, single-event phenomenon, and total dose effects. Spacecraft 

charging results when charges build up on different parts of a spacecraft as it moves 

through concentrated areas of charged particles. Discharge can seriously damage surface 

coatings, degrade solar panels, cause loss of power, and switch off or permanently 

damage electronics. Sputtering damages thermal coatings and sensors simply by highspeed impact, in effect sandblasting the spacecraft. Single charged particles penetrating 

deeply into spacecraft electronics systems may cause a single event phenomenon. For 

example, a single event upset (SEU) or "bit flip" results when a high-energy particle 

impact resets one part of a computer's memory from 1 to 0, or vice versa, causing 

potentially significant changes to spacecraft functions. Total dose effects are long-term 

damage to the crystal structure of semiconductors within a spacecraft's computer caused 

by electrons and protons in the solar wind and the Van Allen belts. Over time, the 

cumulative damage lowers the efficiency of the material, causing computer problems. 

Orbits that pass through an area of higher radiation levels known as the South Atlantic 

anomaly increase the total dose damage during a spacecraft's lifetime. Spacecraft 

shielding and the use of hardened components offer some protection for these effects, as 

does software coding to negate the SEU effects by storing each bit multiple times and 

comparing them during each read operation. But all of these steps come at a cost of 

increased weight, testing requirements, and development time and cost. 

Spacecraft State of the Art 

A spacecraft consists of a payload and its supporting subsystems, also known as the bus. 

Overall payload requirements are defined in terms of the subject with which it must 
interact, and its components are designed to make this interaction possible. Using a 

remote sensing example, the payload could consist of a single simple camera to detect 

light from some ground-based phenomenon or could include a collection of sensors, each 

tuned to detect a particular characteristic (such as wavelength) of that light. The number 

and type of sensors chosen, and how they work together to form the spacecraft's payload, 

determine the spacecraft's design, which in turn generates requirements for the spacecraft 

bus that dictate: 

• payload accommodation mass, volume, and interfaces 

• spacecraft pointing precision 

• data processing and transmission needs

• electrical power needs 

• acceptable operating temperature ranges. 

Spacecraft Subsystems 

Mission designers define these requirements in terms of subsystem performance budgets 

such as the amount of velocity change, electrical power, or other limited resource that it 

must "spend" to accomplish some activity (for example, achieving operational orbit or 

turning on the payload). Six distinct spacecraft bus subsystems support the payload with 

all the necessary functions to keep it healthy and safe: 

• space vehicle control: "steers" the vehicle to control its attitude and orbit, 

attaining and maintaining its operational orbit as well as pointing cameras and 

antennas toward targets on Earth or in space; on-board rockets control the orbit, 

while rockets and other devices rotate it around its center of mass to provide 

stability and precise pointing 

• communication and data handling: monitors payload activities and environmental 

conditions, tracks and controls spacecraft location and attitude, communicates 

with ground controllers or other spacecraft, and warns of anomalies; 

communication requirements analysis produces a link budget that specifies 

communications parameters and the data rate 

• electrical power: converts and conditions energy sources (such as solar) into 

usable electrical power and also stores energy to run the entire spacecraft; 

electrical power requirements for each of the other bus subsystems determine the 

total electrical power budget 

• environmental control (and life support for manned missions): regulates 

component temperatures for proper operation, transferring or eliminating heat 

energy as needed; for manned missions, astronauts must be protected from the 

harsh space environment; provides a breathable atmosphere at a comfortable 

temperature, humidity, and pressure, along with water and food to sustain life 

• structure and mechanisms: protect the payload and subsystems from high launch 

loads; deploy and maintain orientation of spacecraft components (such as solar 

panels and antennas) 

• propulsion: produces thrust to maneuver the spacecraft between orbits and control 

its altitude; highly dependent on altitude and orbital control needs. 
Remote Sensing and Communications Physics 

The most common general categories of spacecraft payloads perform remote sensing and 

communications missions and, as such, represent the variety of technical and operational 

trades and constraints typically found in space mission design. Remote sensing systems 

collect EM radiation reflected or emitted from objects on the Earth's surface, in the 

atmosphere, or in space—including space-based astronomy and space surveillance. Radio 

waves (also EM) are used to communicate to and from the Earth's surface, through the 

atmosphere, and between objects in space. For missions involving Earth sensing or 

communications, then, the transmission characteristics of the Earth's atmosphere—which 

frequencies are blocked, attenuated, or pass freely—drive payload performance and 

design decisions. Figures 4–21 and 4–22 describe the electromagnetic spectrum (in terms 

of EM wavelength and frequency) and the transmission of that spectrum through the 

atmosphere.

Figure 4–21. Electromagnetic Spectrum

Figure 4–22. Atmospheric Windows

While some wavelengths (such as visible light) are completely transmitted, others are 

almost completely blocked. Spacecraft instruments have access to Earth from space 

through various atmospheric windows—wavelength bands in which 80 to 100 percent of 
the available energy is transmitted through the atmosphere. The most notable atmospheric 

windows are the visible, infrared, and radio wavelengths. 

Passive remote sensing systems depend on reflected or emitted EM radiation passing 

through the atmosphere to the space-based sensor. Because objects reflect different 

wavelengths of EM radiation, measuring the amount and type of radiation can describe 

characteristics such as soil properties, moisture content, vegetation types, and many other 

important details. Objects also emit EM radiation at different wavelengths depending on 

their material properties and temperature. The relationship between temperature and 

wavelength of peak emission is well known,17 and coupled with knowledge of the total 

energy output from the target object,18 payload sensors can be designed to sense particular 

phenomena. 

Given the physics of EM radiation, a workable sensor can then be designed. To observe 

an object, however, the spacecraft sensor must be able to point the sensor at the target, 

collect EM radiation from the target, transform the detected radiation into usable data, 

and process the usable data into usable information. First, the object must fall within the 

sensor's field of view—defined as the angular width within which the sensor can see. 

Projected onto the Earth's surface, the field of view translates into the swath width, the 

size of which is determined by the sensor's field of view and the spacecraft's altitude (as 

shown in figure 4–4). Next, the resolution of the sensor—the size of the smallest object it 

can detect—is a function of the wavelength of the radiation sensed, the sensor's aperture 

diameter, and the distance between the sensor and the target.19 

Active remote sensors such as radar transmit their own radiation that reflects from the 

target and returns to the sensor for processing. Space-based radar, for example, permits 

accurate terrain measurement of features to construct a three-dimensional picture of a 

planet's surface. Because resolution relates directly to the wavelength of the transmitted 

and reflected signal, shorter wavelengths yield better resolution than longer wavelengths. 

Optical sensors measure EM wavelengths on the order of 0.5 micrometers (mm), while 

radar systems operate at about 240,000 mm. Thus, for optical and radar systems with the 

same size aperture, the optical system has almost 500,000 times better resolution. For 

conventional radar to have the same resolution as an optical system, the size of the radar's 

aperture must be increased.20 

Space communications systems serve as the backbone for all other space missions in 

addition to being a mission in their own right. The primary goal, of course, is to get data 

to the users, whether that means relaying remote sensing data obtained from space 

sensors to ground systems and users, sending and receiving command and control data 

between spacecraft and ground control centers, or acting as a relay to receive and then 

transmit data from one point on the globe (or in space) to another. Communications 

payloads use a transmitted EM signal to carry data to a receiver. The communications 

link—what happens between the transmitter and the receiver—is the critical feature of 

any communications systems and is characterized by several critical parameters: 

• signal-to-noise ratio 
• bit error rate (signal quality) 

• coverage 

• data rate 

• signal security. 

The signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) is a function of transmitter power and gain, receiver 

bandwidth, temperature and gain, signal wavelength, and range between transmitter and 

receiver. For effective communication, SNR must be greater than or equal to one.21 The 

bit error rate (BER) defines the likelihood of misinterpreting bits in a data stream, 

typically expressed in terms of single bit errors per power of 10 bits.22 Increasing signal 

strength improves BER and can be accomplished by increasing transmitter power and 

antenna size, increasing receiver antenna size, improving receiver characteristics, using 

higher frequencies, or reducing the distance between the transmitter and the receiver. All 

of these factors impact the overall cost of the system. The system designer must 

investigate all available alternatives to obtain the desired signal-to-noise ratio at 

minimum system cost. 

Coverage directly affects communications availability and is a function of satellite 

altitude and orbit, elevation angle of communicating satellites, satellite constellation 

configuration (number of satellites, orbital planes used, and so forth), ground station 

(receiver) location, and cross-linking capability. The simplest satellite communications 

architecture uses a "store-and-forward" approach (figure 4–23, case A) whereby it 

transmits or receives data only passing overhead of a single ground station. Between 

passes, it stores any collected data to be transmitted at the next pass. Adding well-placed 

ground stations improves coverage, as does adding satellites with a cross-link capability 

that would forward data to one or more ground stations, effectively increasing the 

frequency of overhead passes (figure 4–23, case D). Geostationary architectures employ 

three or more satellites along with terrestrial ground sites and cross-linking for global 

coverage (except for high latitudes) (figure 4–23, case B), while Molniya orbits with two 

or more satellites can provide stable, continuous coverage of polar regions (figure 4–23, 

case C). At low altitudes, larger numbers of cross-linked satellites in a properly arranged 

constellation can provide continuous coverage of the Earth (figure 4–23, case E), with the 

most well-known example being the Iridium satellite telephone system.

Figure 4–23. Satellite Coverage Strategies
Data rate is the number of bits per second of information that must be transferred over the 

communications link and is a function of the signal frequency—higher frequency signals 

can better support higher data rates. Enhanced capabilities to support global operations 

such as unmanned aircraft systems, video teleconferencing, or simply providing Super 

Bowl broadcasts to deployed troops create greater demand for higher and higher data 

rates. Signal security and availability include communications security—disguising the 

actual transmitted data and typically including data encryption—and transmission 

security—disguising the transmitted signal, usually by generating security keys and 

variables that support spread spectrum techniques. Availability, on the other hand, 

depends upon the environment's effect on the transmission channel. Communications 

links are typically designed to create an SNR that produces the required BER for the 

anticipated environment (no hostile effects on the transmission channel). Link margin is 

then added to compensate for other expected (and unexpected) operating conditions. 

Signal jamming is an intentional means of corrupting the otherwise benign environment 

by introducing noise into the communications path, resulting in an SNR of less than one. 

Of course, simple interference from other systems operating at the same frequency may 

have a similar, less sinister effect on communications, making frequency deconfliction an 

important factor in insuring effective communications. 

All of these factors will impact the overall cost of the system. The system designer must 

investigate all available alternatives to obtain the desired signal-to-noise ratio at 

minimum system cost. Current trends in space communications focus on using more 

power, higher frequencies, and phased-array antennas to point the beam more precisely to 

make the signals less susceptible to jamming and interference and to increase data rates. 
Conclusion 

Space offers society advantages that have revolutionized modern life since the launch of 

Sputnik 50 years ago and has motivated scientific investigation and dreams of adventure 

for millennia. The global perspective has allowed worldwide communications and remote 

sensing (in many forms) and transformed navigation and timing for civil, military, and 

industrial uses. The challenge of space as a final frontier has lured huge investments by 

nations seeking to increase their international stature while improving their ability to 

provide services to their citizens, motivating the technical progress and patriotism of 

those same citizens, enlarging their international economic influence, and, in many cases, 

increasing their military power. The clear view space provides causes astronomers and 

other scientists to dream of future discoveries about the fundamental nature of life and 

our universe, while the unlimited and largely untapped wealth of space tantalizes citizens 

of the Earth, who are increasingly aware of finite terrestrial resources. 

Realizing these advantages and leveraging the power conferred on those who best exploit 

them, however, require an appreciation of the physics, engineering, and operational 

knowledge unique to space, space systems, and missions. It is precisely because so few 

citizens of Earth have first-hand experience with space—unlike previous terrestrial, 

maritime, and aeronautical "frontiers"—that we must stress some technical understanding 

of these characteristics of space. This chapter may serve as a summary or review of some 

of the key concepts necessary for a firm understanding of the realm of space. Further indepth study, beginning with the references cited within, is de rigueur for anyone 

interested in a better understanding of space policy and power and is especially important 

for space decisionmakers. Making policy and power decisions without this understanding 

would be akin to formulating a maritime strategy using a team of "experts" who had 

never seen the ocean or experienced tides, had no concept of buoyancy, or seen sail or 

shore.

Notes

1. For in-depth development of the concepts introduced in this chapter, refer to Jerry J. Sellers et al., 

Understanding Space: An Introduction to Astronautics, 3d ed. (New York: McGraw-Hill, 2005), 

from which much of this material has been excerpted or summarized. The classic text in this field 

is Roger R. Bate, Donald D. Mueller, and Jerry E. White, Fundamentals of Astrodynamics (New 

York: Dover Publications, 1971). Another excellent reference geared toward those not technically 

trained is David Wright et al., The Physics of Space Security: A Reference Manual (Cambridge: 

American Academy of Arts and Sciences, 2005). 

2. Kepler's First Law applied to Earth-orbiting satellites: the orbit of each planet is an ellipse with the 

Sun at one focus. 

3. Sellers et al., 182–184. 

4. A simple example: to move a satellite from a circular orbit at an altitude of 300 km (a = 6,678 km, 

V total= 7.726 km/sec) to a higher, 1,000 km altitude orbit (a = 7,378 km, V = 7.350 km/sec) 

requires a ΔV total of 378 m/sec. For a 1,000 kg satellite (initial mass on orbit), this would require 

approximately 155 kg of fuel using a common monopropellant rocket propulsion system. 
5. The same process can be used to disperse several satellites placed into an initial, identical orbit by 

a single launch vehicle—the effective reverse of a rendezvous maneuver. The satellites each 

perform well-timed "speed up and slow down" maneuvers to establish a constellation of equally 

spaced satellites (in time and angle) that might provide near-continuous coverage over the Earth. 

6. RAAN precession occurs westward for direct orbits (inclination < 90°), eastward for retrograde 

orbits (inclination > 90°), and zero for polar orbits (inclination = 90°) and equatorial orbits 

(inclination = 0°). 

7. Earth oblateness gives rise to two unique orbits with very practical applications: sun-synchronous 

and Molniya. The first case uses the eastward nodal progression when i > 90°. At i ≈ 98° 

(depending on spacecraft altitude), the ascending node moves eastward at the same rate as the 

Earth around the Sun (about 1° per day), keeping the spacecraft's orbital plane in the same 

orientation to the Sun throughout the year such that the spacecraft will always see the same Sun 

angle when it passes over a particular point on the Earth's surface. This is important for remotesensing missions (such as reconnaissance) because observers can better track long-term changes in 

weather, terrain, and manmade features. The Molniya (in Russian, lightning) orbit is usually a 12-

hour orbit with high eccentricity (e ≈ 0.7), perigee location in the Southern Hemisphere, and i = 

63.4. At this inclination, the perigee does not rotate, so the spacecraft "hangs" over the Northern 

Hemisphere for nearly 11 hours of its 12-hour period before it whips quickly through perigee in 

the Southern Hemisphere. Molniya orbits can provide communication coverage to areas of high 

latitude that could not practically use geostationary orbits. 

8. For example, the European Space Agency's launch site at Kourou (4°N latitude) gives launch 

vehicles an assist of 0.464 km/sec versus 0.4087 km/sec for the Kennedy Space Center at 28.5° 

latitude. 

9. ΔV = Ispgoln mi/mf where go is the gravitational acceleration constant (9.81 m/sec2); mi is the initial 

mass of the spacecraft (fully fueled); and mf is the final mass (fuel empty). 

10. Jerry J. Sellers et al., "Investigation into Cost-Effective Propulsion System Options for Small 

Satellites," Journal of Reducing Space Mission Cost 1, no. 1 (1998). 

11. Recent bounding examples in the United States are Space Exploration (SpaceX) Incorporated's 

Falcon I vehicle (~1,000 pounds to low Earth orbit) on the low end and the two families of 

Evolved Expendable Launch Vehicles (EELV), Lockheed-Martin's Atlas V and Boeing's Delta IV. 

While exact figures on these are not available, low estimates for Falcon I are probably $100 

million, while EELV developmental funding was several billion dollars. 

12. The VentureStar program was canceled in March 2001 after NASA canceled the suborbital X–33 

technology demonstrator meant to reduce risk for full VentureStar development. NASA 

expenditures for X–33 totaled $912 million. 

13. Sellers, Understanding Space, 84. 

14. James R. Wertz and Wiley J. Larson, eds., Space Mission Analysis and Design, 3d ed. (Dordrecht,

Netherlands: Kluwer Academic Publishers, 1999). 

15. The French Cerise spacecraft became the first certified victim of space junk when its 6-meter 

gravity-gradient boom was clipped during a collision with a leftover piece of an Ariane launch 

vehicle in 1996. 

16. Wertz and Larson, 1999.

17. Given by Wien's Displacement Law, λm=2898/T, where λm is the wavelength of maximum output 

in micrometers (mm) and T is the object's temperature in degrees Kelvin. 

18. Given by the Stefan-Boltzmann equation, qA = εσT4, where qA is the object's power per unit area 

(W/m2), ε is the object's emissivity (0≤ε≤1), s is the Stefan-Boltzmann constant (5.67 x 10-8 

W/m2K4), and T is the object's temperature in degrees Kelvin. 

19. Resolution = 2.44λh/D where λ is the wavelength of the sensed radiation, h is the distance between 

the sensor and the target, and D is the instrument's aperture diameter. 

20. A conventional radar operating at a wavelength of 240,000 mm would need an aperture of more 

than 480 km (298 miles) to get the same resolution as an optical system with a mere 1-meter 

aperture! Fortunately, signal-processing techniques that enable synthetic aperture radar—

effectively enlarging the radar aperture—can achieve much higher effective apertures and thus 

higher resolutions. 
21. SNR=(Pt

Gt/kB)/(λ/4πR)/(Gr/T) where P is transmitter power, Gt is transmitter gain, k is 

Boltzmann's constant, B is the receiver system's bandwidth, λ is the signal wavelength, R is the 

range to receiver, Gr is the receiver gain, and T is the receiver system's temperature. 

22. For example, a bit error rate of 10–3 implies an error rate of 1 bit out of every 1,000 bits; typical 

bit error rates are ~10–5 for voice and ~10–14 for data. 
Chapter 5:

Commercial Space and Spacepower

Henry R. Hertzfeld

<hr size=2 width="100%" align=center> 

It is increasingly apparent that commercial opportunities for using space to make money 

by selling goods and services to governments and private customers are growing. Over 

the past 50 years, the United States has been the technological and commercial world 

leader in space. U.S. space policies, as reflected particularly in Presidential Directives but 

also in legislation and in regulations, reflect this leadership role. From the very first space 

policies in the Dwight D. Eisenhower administration to the present, policy documents 

assume that the United States is the world leader, attempt to ensure that role continues, 

and reserve the right to use the necessary means to protect space assets. 

Until the 1980s, private companies in the United States were contractors and suppliers to 

the government space program and projects. They did not offer space services to the 

public. The one exception to this was in the important area of telecommunications. From 

the very beginning of the space age, U.S. private companies (in particular, AT&T) 

designed, built, and operated communications satellites and sold services to the public 

under strict government regulations and supervision. 

Today, the landscape has changed. Companies in the United States are in direct 

competition with many foreign entities in space in almost all areas: launch vehicles, 

remote sensing satellites, telecommunications satellites of all kinds (voice, direct TV, 

fixed and mobile services), and navigation services.The technological capability to build 

and operate sophisticated space equipment has spread worldwide. 

All evidence points to a continuation of this trend. Space has become a global enterprise 

with the number of nations and firms with space goods and services growing rapidly. 

And not only are more people involved in space but also the unique advantages of the 

space environment have contributed greatly to the growing trend toward globalization 

through its almost universal coverage of populated areas with communications and 

observation products and services. 

In turn, an increase in globalization can stimulate the further growth of commercial space 

by making even larger markets with corresponding sales potentially available to 

companies. Globalization must be viewed as a summation of various components 

(political, business, and cultural). Space capabilities and technologies contribute 

differently to each component, and the extent of meaningful globalization must be 

analyzed by its components, not in the aggregate. This chapter will discuss the long-run 

trend toward globalization and how the growth of multinational companies and the global 

marketplace has influenced commercial space and spacepower. 
Although no other nation spends as much on space as the United States, the ability of the 

U.S. Government to influence the rest of the world in space policy and in the use of space 

has greatly diminished over time. In some ways, space has become just another 

commodity. But government policy and security aspects of space do not treat commercial 

space as they treat automobiles, soap, or furniture. Because of the strategic value of space 

as well as the huge dependence of almost every industry on the space infrastructure, 

space commands special importance and has become a critical national resource. 

This chapter will also review the process by which the U.S. Government has developed 

official policies toward space that have fueled the technological lead and put the United 

States at the forefront of space activity, while at the same time transferring some of the 

responsibility of this lead from purely government programs to the domestic commercial 

sector. However, other policies of the U.S. Government have had the opposite effect, 

encouraging foreign nations to develop similar and competitive space capabilities. 

Questions without clear answers are the degree to which U.S. policy has sped up foreign 

space capabilities and what the effect has been on spacepower. Of course, not all foreign 

space programs can be attributed to U.S. policy actions. Because of the obvious 

advantage of using space for global monitoring, communications, and other activities, 

other nations naturally have had the desire and have developed independent space assets 

and capabilities. 

Spacepower 

Spacepower can be viewed from a commercial perspective in two ways. The first is 

economic: encouragement of commercial U.S. space ventures to be dominant in the 

world marketplace, either through creation of a monopoly or by sheer market dominance. 

The latter often makes competitors follow the leader's standards and practices, which in 

turn practically assures that others will adopt systems compatible with those of the 

market leader.1 The second is by a show of strength: aggressively denying others access 

or interfering with the operations of foreign space assets. 

This chapter will focus on policies of commercial market dominance. Therefore, 

spacepower will be discussed without the notion of military control or aggressive action 

to protect space assets or deny others the ability to operate in space. A truly competitive 

commercial world assumes that companies can operate on a level playing field and that 

the deciding factor is the ability to make a profit rather than the ability to take out a 

potential competitor by military action.2 

Looking to the future growth of commercial space companies and the multinational 

aspects of commercial space raises an interesting question regarding spacepower. 

Specifically, will it be possible for commercial interests to supersede other national 

interests in space? The short answer is no. Besides the clear dual use of all space 

products, space law, as defined by current United Nations treaties on outer space, makes 

nations responsible for the actions of their citizens in outer space. To get to space and to 

do anything there, a company will need the formal approval of a parent nation. Since 
each nation may be both jointly and separately liable for certain types of damage from 

space objects, it will be difficult, if not impossible, for a company to operate in space 

without supervision. Therefore, unless the major legal tenets of space activity change, 

commercial interests will be subservient to national interests in space and will face major 

regulatory controls.3 

Globalization and the Changing International Economic Environment 

Globalization is the process of human interaction characterized by the ease of 

transcending national borders for variously defined ends.4 There are many different 

aspects of globalization occurring at any given point in time. It is important to distinguish 

between geopolitical globalization, multinational economic globalization, and 

cultural/information networks that have become global.

Figure 5–1. Degrees of Globalization

Figure 5–1 illustrates the range of possible degrees of globalization. As one moves to the 

left of the diagram, the degree of interaction among nations increases. At the other 

extreme, nations may choose to isolate themselves and raise barriers to global 

interactions. The concept of regionalization is intended to meet a middle ground where 

select groups of nations agree to form alliances. Since the overall concept of globalization 

is the combination of the different elements suggested above, it is instructive to look at 

the relative position on the continuum for each major element. In general, economic and 

cultural globalization today has moved toward the left of center, while geopolitical 

globalization is somewhere to the right of that. 

Some of the most visible trends in today's world are the growth of multinational firms, 

the ease of financial transactions internationally, and the spread of ideas, culture, and 

entertainment through the advances in communication technologies. The availability and 

advantages of satellite communications have greatly contributed to these trends through 

both global coverage and the opening of the global communications services and markets 

to all nations. 

Globalization is not a new phenomenon, nor is it inevitable.5 Decreases in barriers to 

trade—most recently through the North American Free Trade Agreement and the World 

Trade Organization, but through other bilateral agreements in the past as well—and better 

coordination among nations characterized the decade of the 1990s. Similar eras of 

increased interaction among people have existed before the most recent times but have 

then been followed by wars, economic depressions, or other occurrences, which slowed 

or stopped the trend toward globalization. Even in the first few years of the 21st century, 
the changed policies and attitudes toward international travel and security because of the 

events of September 11 have, at least temporarily, slowed the rapid globalization pace 

established in the 1990s.6 

Other influences may also slow economic globalization. As described by Rawi Abdelal 

and Adam Segal, the speed of globalization may become less rapid in the upcoming years 

for the following reasons: politicians are more nervous about letting capital goods and 

people move more freely across borders, energy is the object of intense resource 

nationalism, and bilateral agreements appear to be replacing multilateral agreements 

(particularly with the United States skeptical of "global rulemaking").7 

As impressive as the economic and cultural spread of ideas and interactions has been 

during the past several decades, it has been balanced by the decided lack of geopolitical 

globalization. With the important exception of the European Union (a limited form of 

primarily economic globalization on a regional basis), nations have not changed their 

approach to territorial rights.8 These rights are jealously guarded and are strong limits to 

true international geopolitical globalization. 

Although there has been a trend toward multinational firms and a global economic 

regime, history has shown that there is no assurance that this trend will continue on a 

smooth path. Current economic globalization is dependent on nations moving toward a 

free market–based economy that also implies some form of democratic government. 

Economic globalization also depends on the establishment of a relatively uniform 

regulatory system that is predictable, fair, and enforceable. 

Space is a global industry. Within limits established by the political system, companies 

compete for launch services internationally. Satellite manufacturing, once heavily 

dependent on U.S. companies, is now an industry with companies located around the 

world. Space services are also available internationally. However, because of the dual-use 

nature of many space activities, there are regulatory and legal limits on the degree of 

international trade that can occur in this industry. 

There are many good economic reasons that explain why commercial space needs to be 

global in nature to survive in a competitive world. Primarily, it is the satellite capability 

to connect to ground stations anywhere in the world and to transmit data and information 

globally (or, if not to all nations, to a vast majority of the world's populated areas). To 

make a profit on an investment that has high technological risk and very high up-front 

demands, a large market is essential. The additional cost of adding a new ground station 

is small in comparison to the cost of the space system. Since satellites can have global 

coverage, having a global market becomes an attractive profit potential. It can be easily 

argued that many space services are "natural monopolies." That is, one large provider can 

have the ability to serve all customers much more inexpensively than can multiple 

providers.9 

However, in economic government regulatory policy, a monopoly of any sort is counter 

to a free market competitive philosophy. It should be noted, though, that early U.S. policy 
encouraged a U.S. monopoly in international telecommunications, not for reasons of 

economic efficiency, but for U.S. control and security (see the discussion below on U.S. 

telecommunications policy). 

Globalization can have both positive and negative effects on the growth of the space 

sector and on the development of specific space applications. On the positive side, 

privatization of space assets would be possible if markets were large enough to be 

profitable for some space activities. If this were to occur, governments would have to be 

willing to relinquish some control of space activities. Applications that involve very large 

international markets—such as launch services, remote sensing, distance learning, and 

telemedicine—would benefit. 

Globalization also would mean rising per capita income among most nations (although at 

different rates of growth), which would create the potential for more markets for space 

(and other) goods and services. New and larger markets might open opportunities for the 

expansion of currently profitable consumer space-related services such as global 

positioning system (GPS) navigation equipment and telecommunications (informationbased) services, and perhaps the use of space for entertainment services (such as real-time 

distribution of movies and new music delivery services). 

On the negative side, globalization and economic growth are likely to stimulate a 

backlash among some in society who will push for a "simpler" life and are against using 

new technology. A cultural backlash can also be expected that, coupled with the spread of 

highly advanced communications and space technology, is likely to encourage 

countermeasures by advocates wanting to block or reduce the influence of alien cultures. 

Security and defense issues will be of major governmental concern. Space applications 

will be used to monitor and control these activities, and this should be a growth sector for 

government programs using new satellites. However, this can easily lead to a decline in 

market-based commercial space applications as government demands and regulations 

supplant the development of private market opportunities. 

In the financial community, commercial space activities would have to be shown to have 

a greater opportunity cost and return on investment (ROI) than other high-technology and 

high-risk investments. As with other "negative" aspects of globalization, the availability 

of sufficient private capital for space investments will depend more on opportunity costs 

and the expected ROI of specific projects than it will on globalization. When dual-use 

technologies are involved, a lack of private capital will necessitate government subsidies. 

Regionalization 

The effects of regionalization are likely to be similar to those of globalization on space, 

although at somewhat lower levels of activity due to: 

• less harmonization among nations in areas of regulation 

• possibility of more regional conflicts 
• lower per capita income growth 

• less convergence of growth rates in general. 

Nevertheless, satellite capabilities will be used for additional security concerns and for 

global monitoring. There is likely to be less private sector investment in space under this 

scenario than under the globalization scenario. However, regional markets may be large 

enough to support sizable space investments by the private sector. Other than the 

European Union, regional cooperation in space has not been a market or security issue to 

date. 

Crisis/Independence 

If nations increasingly choose to develop independent space systems, defense and other 

government uses of space will become more important with governments discouraging 

private investment in space because of the potential dangers of dual-use technologies in 

the hands of companies and other nations. Since each nation will attempt to develop its 

own space systems, the duplication and oversupply of both hardware and space products 

will act to discourage commercial space investments. Technological progress in areas 

such as space science and exploration would be hurt greatly by the divergence of funds to 

more immediate problems. 

Finally, private investment in space will be even more challenged, but governments may 

opt to purchase space services directly from domestic commercial private firms. These 

firms may be precluded by regulation or contract from offering services to customers in 

the general marketplace. 

Globalization and Spacepower 

Globalization is not an inevitable outcome of current and past trends, but some very 

important aspects of globalization are on a steadily expanding path that is unlikely to be 

deterred. They include multinational business and financial connections and networks as 

well as cross-border information, cultural, and entertainment products and services. 

Space assets provide a key enabling infrastructure component of both of these 

developments. 

The commercial space activities that are profitable today are those that serve these sectors 

by providing rapid worldwide communications. Whether it is navigation and timing 

services of the GPS satellites, or direct TV broadcasts, or very small aperture terminal 

links of the credit card companies, or electronic financial trading, the global economic 

system is now linked via satellites and space capabilities. If it were not for the existence 

of a large and well-funded global market for these services, the satellite systems serving 

them would likely not be profitable. What has developed over time is a circular 

dependence: technologies create new economic opportunities, and large markets create 

profitable infrastructure investments with subsequent multiplicative terrestrial businesses. 
However, this evolution of satellite services (from the early space years when 

governments provided and controlled the telecommunications satellites) has created 

dilemmas. No longer can a nation such as the United States even rationally plan for 

control of the systems or capabilities. In time of conflict, it would be almost impossible to 

interrupt services because businesses and governments as customers depend on them. In 

fact, the government is one of the major users of commercial communications networks. 

Another dilemma is that satellite signals do not cleanly begin and end at national borders. 

Some nations are increasingly incensed at their inability to censor or control economic 

and political messages received by their populations. Similarly, some cultures are 

attempting to resist the intrusions of Western values that are predominant in the business 

and entertainment sectors. This is creating political and regional isolationist sentiments 

that may someday result in attempts to interrupt certain satellite transmissions. Such 

attempts make the issue of spacepower integral to both the growth of globalization and 

the continued development of large world markets for satellite services that can create 

profits and new commercial space endeavors. The nation that leads in commercial space 

will have a larger share of economic growth and be able to dictate industry standards, an 

important tool for future economic dominance as well as for space security. 

Thus, if globalization continues its rapid advance, then a nation's commercial spacepower 

is of greater importance; if globalization stalls, dedicated national security and military 

uses of space will increase, and a nation's ability to garner larger market shares for 

commercial services will be more limited.10 Spacepower may then be determined more by 

military power than market power. 

U.S. Government Approach to Commercial Space over Time 

This brief review of U.S. Government space policy documents as they relate to 

commercial space activities clearly shows a changing attitude and increasing dependence 

on private space activities. U.S. Government space policy, however, is very complex and 

is not adequately or comprehensively reflected in any one document or even any one 

series of documents (such as Presidential Decision Directives [PDDs] on Space Policies). 

When viewed from a commercial space perspective, even analyzing only unclassified 

policies yields a set of guidelines that is sometimes inconsistent. At any given time, one 

can point to both documents in which the government provides incentives for commercial 

space to develop and mature and ones in which significant barriers to commercial space 

exist. Sometimes these incentives and barriers are erected purposefully and sometimes 

they are inadvertent, being unintended byproducts of other government priorities and 

initiatives Several categories of government policies will be described below. First, 

trends in PDDs that have direct implications for commercial space are analyzed. Second, 

PDDs and documents concerning the satellite communications sector are described. 

Third, major legislative changes that have had an impact on the development of 

commercial space and regulations imposed on commercial space endeavors over time are 

reviewed. Fourth, other government policies such as the deregulation of many industries 

and the decision of the Department of Defense (DOD) to encourage the consolidation of 

aerospace companies are discussed. 
A summary of government policy toward commercial space produces a confused set of 

signals to the industry and to foreign governments and potential competitors. The reasons 

for the contradictions include: 

• the important role of space in national security and a goal of reserving some space 

capabilities, whether commercially or government owned, for national purposes 

• a rapidly changing industry that has not yet reached commercial maturity 

• the use of space assets for international political purposes 

• changes in government policy over time concerning competition and deregulation.

Finally, it should be noted that most other nations have developed space capabilities and 

space programs to encourage and subsidize economic growth through cutting-edge 

technological developments (as well as to create jobs).11 The charters of most foreign 

space agencies specifically state this as one goal.12 That provides a basis for an overt and 

active "industry policy" toward space. The United States has a government philosophy of 

not having an industry policy for any economic sector, therefore making it more difficult 

for the government to find a unified way of providing incentives to any industry, 

aerospace included.13 

Presidential Space Documents and Decisions 

Since 1960, there have been seven major Presidential documents on space policy. 

Changes over time to the policies have never been radical but have reflected changing 

technological, political, and economic conditions. The following discussion will broadly 

summarize the approach over time of the various administrations to commercial space 

and will analyze the significance of those changes to the U.S. economy and to how 

commercial space plays a role in spacepower.14 It is clear from the very rudimentary 

count of words in these documents that the economic and commercial aspects of space 

only became important policy considerations in the 1980s (see figure 5–2). 

Figure 5–2. Commercial Space in Presidential Space Policy
Space policy emerged from the Cold War as a security, political, and technological 

endeavor for the United States. Early space policies focused on ensuring the security of 

the United States through winning the technological race with the former Soviet Union. 

In addition, there were concerns and issues of nuclear proliferation and deterrence in 

those early space policies, reflecting the capabilities of launch vehicles to deliver 

weapons. The economic capabilities of the United States were mentioned in the 

Eisenhower Policy but more as a general recognition that the design and development of 

space equipment would stimulate the economy. That is, jobs would be created and 

possible spin-off products would enter the economy. The Eisenhower Policy also 

recognized the future potential economic aspects of two civilian applications of space 

technologies, communications and meteorology, but these technologies were not 

discussed in detail in this overall policy document.15 

It is also interesting to note that the Eisenhower Policy called for international 

cooperation in civilian space exploration, but at the same time space was to "demonstrate 

an over-all U.S. superiority in outer space without necessarily requiring the United States 

supremacy in every phase of space activities."16 

The beginnings of change were apparent in the 1978 National Space Policy of the Jimmy 

Carter administration that focused on remote sensing; it called for a study and report on 

private sector involvement and investment in civil remote sensing systems.17 

The official encouragement of commercial space did not occur until the 1980s.18 Several 

different domestic factors, as well as several international developments, were 

responsible. First was the beginning of the maturation of the Earth observation satellites 

and the growth of a private value-added industry selling specialized products based on 
Landsat imagery. Second was the successful partial commercialization of the upper 

stages of launch vehicles (the Payload Assist Modules). Third was the Challenger 

accident in 1986 that suddenly changed the launch scenario for commercial satellites 

(mostly telecommunications).19 

On the international scene, the 1980s were marked by the success of the French Ariane 

launch vehicle and Spot remote sensing satellites. Both were designed to directly 

compete with U.S. systems and were marketed by private companies but were essentially 

vehicles funded through government sources. Other nations were also beginning to 

design and build competitive commercial space systems and satellites. 

Therefore, on both the domestic and foreign fronts, commercial companies that had been 

solely government contractors for space equipment were branching into independent 

offerings of space components and systems. The industry was beginning to mature and, at 

the same time, the United States was entering an era of overall policy shifts toward 

economic deregulation of all industry. Although space would never be "deregulated," the 

philosophical shift meant more attention to commercial capabilities and opportunities 

along with the recognition that the government could be a customer for rather than a 

producer of some space goods and services. 

The Ronald Reagan administration policies of 1982 and 1984 further extended the 

mandate for the government to both "obtain economic and scientific benefits through the 

exploitation of space, and expand United States private-sector investment and 

involvement in the civil space and space-related activities.20 Collectively, these policies 

emphasized that the space systems were to be for national economic benefit and that the 

U.S. Government would provide a climate conducive to expanded private sector 

investment and involvement in civil space activities with due regard to public safety and 

national security. It also called for a regulatory and supervisory system. 

It should be noted that all policies that encouraged private sector space activity and 

commercialization of space also contained caveats that required the consideration of 

national security. Thus, any commercial space venture had, and still has, investment risk 

that is subject to deliberately vague government rules and possible decisions on what 

might constitute a breach of national security.21 

The George H.W. Bush administration expanded these commercial policies.22 

Collectively, they called for the active encouragement of commercial investments in 

space as well as for the promotion of commercial space activities. There were even 

directions in the policy of 1991 to study the possible disposition of missiles by converting 

them into commercial launchers. (This was subject to a number of security and economic 

caveats.) Also of significance was the mandate for the government not only to promote 

commercial remote sensing, but also to "not preclude" private sector remote sensing 

activities. 

The Bill Clinton administration took further steps to encourage commercial space. In 

particular, remote sensing again was the focus of attention, with not only the previous 
security limits on the resolution of imagery that could be made public greatly relaxed, but 

also with specific policies on remote sensing that were to support and enhance U.S. 

global competitiveness in the international remote sensing market. Success in this type of 

commercial activity was viewed as contributing to our critical industrial base.23 

Another Clinton policy directive called for the private sector to have a significant role in 

managing the development and operation of a new reusable space transportation system. 

The National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) was directed to "actively 

involve the private sector."24 Although this system (the X–33/VentureStar Project) was 

begun but never completed, it was one of the first major initiatives in space for a 

public/private partnership in the research and development (R&D) of a new launch 

system. 

By the mid-1990s, the GPS military navigation satellites, which had a free and open 

signal, had stimulated a rapidly growing private sector market for ground receivers. A 

policy directive issued in 1996 clearly recognized that the private sector investment in 

U.S. GPS technologies and services was important for economic competitiveness, and the 

policy encouraged continued private activity in this area, subject to issues of national 

security.25 

The George W. Bush administration issued a set of space policies dealing with specific 

issues (Earth observations, transportation, navigation, and the vision for exploration) as 

well as the final policy document that covers overall space policy.26 The commitment to 

promoting and encouraging commercial activity is continued in all of these policies. 

However, in the overall policy document issued in August 2006, there is a noticeable 

decrease in references to commercial objectives and a noticeable increase in references to 

national security issues. 

This should not be interpreted as a retreat from supporting commercial space endeavors. 

In fact, there are more companies involved in entrepreneurial space activities than ever 

before in the United States and the rest of the world. And the U.S. Government is actively 

promoting commercial ventures, both independently of and with government support, in 

programs such as NASA's commercial-off-the-shelf initiative. In addition, NASA is 

actively seeking foreign national and commercial partnerships and initiatives for future 

activities on the Moon. 

But this new policy should also serve as a sobering warning that national security will 

supersede commercial issues, if necessary, adding a significant risk to commercial 

investments on one hand, and insuring that U.S. commercial interests in space will be 

backed by some form of government protective action if they are threatened. 

In summary, overall space policy directives have slowly been transformed from a Cold 

War emphasis that marginalized the economic and commercial implications of space 

activities into a truly integrated policy that recognizes the maturity of many space 

applications, sophisticated industrial capabilities, the globalization of space technologies, 

and the importance of the space infrastructure to both civilian uses and security concerns. 
It is important to recognize that events in the past 6 years in the United States have led to 

a new space policy that continues to recognize and encourage commercial space, but with 

a greater emphasis on security and on the protection of both public and private U.S. space 

assets. 

In the early years of space, the dominance of the United States in its technology permitted 

spacepower to be practically a given, rivaled only by the competition with the Soviet 

Union. Today, the reality is that the Nation is still the leader in space expenditures but no 

longer dominates or controls developments in many space applications. Spacepower, as it 

might be measured by dominance in economic or commercial space activity, is broadly 

spread around the globe. There are only limited ways the United States can use 

commercial space for maintaining elements of control over the industry. One is to have 

the largest market share in any sector, which encourages others who may want to 

compete to adopt compatible standards for interoperability. The other is to be the leader 

in developing new technology and establish dominant control over particular markets by 

protecting that technology. Both methods are risky, expensive, and do not necessarily 

guarantee success. 

The only other way the United States can assert spacepower in the commercial sector is 

by using nonmarket (political, diplomatic, or military) actions to discourage or deny 

others access to commercial space. It is highly unlikely in today's world that such 

measures would be successful. Other nations have independent access to space and space 

assets. Many companies using space for commercial purposes are multinational 

enterprises, often with significant U.S. corporate investments and components. And the 

U.S. Government itself depends not only on U.S. commercial space goods and services 

but also on foreign systems.27 Therefore, at this time, disrupting the fragile market and 

price system that is developing for space commercial assets would not be in the best 

interests of the United States. 

GovernmentPolicytowardTelecommunications Satellites 

Until the 1990s, most space policy topics were covered in overall policy statements.28 

Telecommunications was handled separately from the very beginning of the space era, 

mainly because in the 1950s and 1960s, its relevance to security and its obvious 

commercial potential were much further developed than other space applications. In 

addition, telecommunications was truly a public/private endeavor, mainly developed in 

the private sector by AT&T. As early as the mid-1950s, comparisons were made that 

showed the tremendous capacity increases that could be available through satellite 

telephone calls when compared to the capacity of the transatlantic cable at that time.29 

The change in 1961 from the Republican Eisenhower administration to the Democratic 

John F. Kennedy administration also signaled a change in attitude toward the 

telecommunications satellite system. In the Eisenhower era, it was accepted that AT&T 

was the monopoly provider of long-distance telephone service, and having the company 

expand into satellite service was not disputed. In fact, there was a clear recognition that a 

U.S. monopoly in satellite communications would be advantageous from many 
perspectives, ranging from control over the world system (and also, therefore, increasing 

the military and economic power of the United States) to cost efficiencies from scale 

economies of operation. 

The Kennedy administration altered this perspective and encouraged competition in the 

United States for privately funded satellite systems by awarding contracts for the 

development of new communications satellites by several firms. AT&T launched the 

Telstar system of two satellites in 1962, NASA awarded a competitive contract to RCA 

for the Relay satellites, also first launched in 1962, and Hughes received a sole-source 

NASA contract for the Syncom satellites, launched first in 1963. 

As the need for a world satellite communications system developed, COMSAT was 

formed in 1962 as a U.S. public corporation with shares held by both the communications 

companies as well as the general public. It was not only the manager for the International 

Telecommunications Satellite Corporation (Intelsat), but also was its U.S. official 

representative. Intelsat was formed in 1964, and its first satellite, Early Bird, was 

launched the next year. As early as 1969, there was global coverage, with agreements in 

place for ground stations across the world. 

In 1965, the Lyndon Johnson administration approved National Security Action 

Memorandum 338, which clearly stated the U.S. policy toward foreign communications 

capabilities.30 The essence of this policy was to encourage a single global commercial 

communications satellite system. It stated that the United States should refrain from 

providing assistance to other countries that would significantly promote, stimulate, or 

encourage proliferation of communications satellite systems. It went on to say that the 

United States should not consider foreign requests for launch services in connections with 

communications satellites (except for those satellites that would be part of the 

international system). 

The European (French-German) Symphonie satellite program begun in 1967 presents an 

interesting case study. This was the first European-built telecommunications satellite, and 

the Europeans requested a launch to geosynchronous orbit from NASA. The United 

States, as a matter of policy, would not guarantee them a launch opportunity for 

Symphonie as an operational satellite. (Eventually, the United States did launch the 

satellite in 1974 under the policy exception that the satellite was an experimental one.) 

This U.S. refusal to launch a foreign, and possibly competing, satellite was one of the 

main factors prompting the development in Europe of the Ariane launch vehicle so that 

Europe would have an independent capability to launch its own operational satellites.31 

What this example illustrates is that a policy of spacepower (denying others access to 

space while attempting to create a U.S.-led monopoly) can backfire by providing 

incentives for others to be able to ignore U.S. policies by building and operating their 

own systems. As is well known, the Ariane launch system was optimized to capture the 

launch market for commercial telecommunications satellite launches to geosynchronous 

orbit. It became a huge tactical and market success, capturing over 60 percent of the 
commercial launch market by the 1990s and effectively eliminating any hope of U.S. 

"control" of the launch vehicle market, particularly for telecommunications satellites.32 

Over time, with the trend in the United States toward deregulation, the 

telecommunications industry monopolies have disappeared. At the same time, many 

nations have built and launched domestic telecommunications satellites. COMSAT 

became a private company and has now disappeared after being sold to Lockheed-Martin. 

Intelsat (and Inmarsat) are now privately operated. Many firms around the world are able 

to build new telecommunications satellites, and the U.S. position in this industry has 

changed from a virtual monopoly to a large, but by no means dominant, competitor. 

Other Government RegulatoryActions 

Besides the official administration PDDs on space activities, there are numerous other 

social, technological, budget, political, and economic actions that are decided by all 

branches of the government—executive, legislative, and judicial. Some are related to 

space issues but are handled through other venues. Antitrust reviews, for example, done 

by the Department of Justice and the Federal Trade Commission, often have far-reaching 

space and spacepower implications when dealing with firms engaged in space activities. 

The list of direct and tangential actions with an impact on spacepower would span almost 

the entire spectrum of government activities, from securities regulations to decisions from 

the courts. 

Examples 

Below, some examples are listed.33 The major issue for consideration in the context of 

spacepower, however, is that many actions taken by the government for very valid 

purposes that are unrelated to space may create conditions that negate the ability to carry 

out space policies as proscribed in PDDs and/or create incentives for other nations or the 

companies in other nations to more aggressively develop systems in direct competition 

with U.S. capabilities. Taken collectively, many of these actions may make any attempt 

at a U.S. policy that emphasizes economic spacepower very difficult, if not impossible, to 

carry out. And looking historically, many of these nonspace policies and actions may 

have created and sped up the development of robust space capabilities in other nations, 

which, in turn, has weakened U.S. economic leadership in space and diluted the Nation's 

power in space systems development as well as in the technology and use of space 

applications.34 

Overall U.S. Government philosophy toward economic deregulation of 

industry.Deregulation, along with policies to avoid developing government enterprises, is 

oriented toward letting the market and price system allocate resources more efficiently 

than government fiat can do. This works well in a truly competitive industry with many 

producers and many consumers. Unfortunately, space is an industry characterized by only 

a few producers and with governments as the major purchasers. What has occurred is a 

shift in power and human resource capability from governments to large corporations. 

Whether this is advantageous to either the development of space commerce or to U.S. 
spacepower is a matter of empirical analysis and further research, neither of which has 

been done as yet.35 

Overall government attempts to privatize and outsource functions.Examples such as the 

attempted privatization of remote sensing satellites, first in the late 1970s and again in the 

mid-1980s, were premature and not very successful. In fact, the suggestion that the 

satellite weather service be privatized resulted in Congress declaring that meteorology 

and weather systems were a "public good" and would not be privatized. Essentially, the 

private market for space goods and services has never developed as rapidly as was 

expected, and most of these proposals have not happened due mainly to a lack of a 

sizable nongovernment market as well as to the large up-front investments. 

DOD incentives for mergers and combinations of firms since the 1990s.As discussed 

below, this has encouraged a more oligopolistic space industry in the United States. It 

also encouraged similar combinations abroad as the only way other nations could 

compete with U.S. companies. Lower-tier suppliers have been subsumed under larger 

companies, and the result has been a different type of competition than existed before 

these developments in the space sector. It has also created more powerful and capable 

foreign competition. 

Examples from Space-related Decisions 

Imposition of strict export controls on space systems and high-technology products.

Both U.S. and foreign industries as well as foreign governments have complained bitterly 

about the strict enforcement of export control laws since the late 1990s. It is increasingly 

more difficult to share R&D information, to sell U.S. space goods and services abroad, 

and to cooperate with foreign nations, even on government projects. The hardest hit space 

industry has been satellite manufacturing in the United States, where foreign competitors 

have built and are selling equipment worldwide at the expense of a market that formerly 

was controlled and dominated by U.S. firms. 

Sunset provisions on indemnification of space third-party liability.Although perhaps of 

a lesser economic disadvantage to the United States in providing competition in launch 

services, most foreign launch companies fully indemnify their domestic industry from the 

unlikely, but possibly very expensive, liability claims that could accrue if there were a 

major disaster from a space object destroying property or taking lives upon reentering the 

Earth's atmosphere. The United States requires private insurance and indemnifies firms 

(with a cap) on claims above what insurance would pay. That is a reasonable policy, but 

it has never been made permanent. Congress has consistently put a sunset provision into 

that authorizing legislation and therefore has increased the risk of investment for U.S. 

launch firms compared to our foreign competitors. 

Decision in the 1970s to put all commercial payloads on the space shuttle and not fund 

R&D for expendable vehicles. The economic results of the Challenger disaster in 1986 

clearly highlighted the potential problems with this policy. In particular, Arianespace, the 

French/European launch vehicle company, was developing a series of vehicles mainly 
designed for the commercial market in geosynchronous telecommunications satellites. As 

a result of the United States falling behind in R&D and manufacturing of expendable 

rockets and the change in policy toward commercial space shuttle launches after 

Challenger, Arianespace was able to capture up to 60 percent of the launch market. The 

United States needed over a decade and a major policy shift toward stimulating 

commercial launch developments before being able to regain some of the lost market 

share. 

Decision not to authorize launches of foreign operational telecommunications satellites 

on U.S. launch vehicles. As with other restrictive policies, nations were given the 

incentive to develop independent capabilities. With the ensuing maturation of launch and 

satellite technologies, they were able to build very competitive and capable equipment 

without U.S. components or assistance.36 

DOD decision to retain governance of GPS. Even though GPS was funded, designed, 

built, and operated by DOD, it had provided an unencrypted free signal for worldwide 

use as part of the program. Use of this signal has grown into a multibillion-dollar industry 

very quickly. Receivers are manufactured in many nations, and the system has become 

one of the important infrastructure services offered from space. It is important now to 

both the military and to civilian communications and timing systems. From the mid1990s to today, it has been the only fully operating space navigation system. That is 

about to change as Europe, Russia, and possibly China develop their own systems. 

Nobody questions the integrity or value of the U.S. global positioning system, but 

partially because it is controlled by DOD without any inputs from other nations, there are 

incentives to invest billions of dollars abroad to duplicate the capability. From a military 

viewpoint, not giving up control of a critical technology is understandable, but from a 

practical and economic perspective, the United States likely could have maintained a 

monopoly position, or at least greatly stalled foreign developments, if the government 

had been able to compromise on this policy. 

Delayed decision to allow release of higher resolution images from Earth observation 

satellites for civil and commercial purposes. By the early 1990s, when the restriction 

was lifted on releasing or permitting private U.S. companies to collect or sell imagery 

with a resolution of less than 10 meters, France had been selling such imagery on the 

open market, as had Russia. Again, nations with aggressive economic and industry space 

policies were able to capture market shares from U.S. companies hindered by policies 

designed for security, not commercial purposes. 

The United States and the Changing International Space Environment 

In the early days of space activity, the United States and the Soviet Union were alone in 

having a full range of space capabilities. National security, particularly with respect to 

fear of the use and/or spread of nuclear weapons, and Cold War–era jockeying for both 

economic and technological supremacy were the driving forces behind the space race. 

Private sector initiatives and the commercialization of space were concepts and ideas far 

from being realized. Even telecommunications through satellites was in its infancy and, at 
least in the United States, involved private companies but only under careful economic 

regulatory supervision. Essentially, there was no commercial or economic issue of any 

great magnitude for the government to be concerned about. And where it might be 

possible, the United States had a virtual lock on competition. 

Today, just about everything has turned around. There is no technological race with 

another superpower. Nuclear technology has spread across the world despite remaining 

under strict controls. Likewise, space capabilities ranging from launch vehicles to 

satellites are available to almost any nation with the money and inclination to purchase 

them. Space technical and manufacturing capability exists in just about every developed 

region of the world, and nations are not dependent on the United States. The world 

economy has become far more interconnected, and U.S. dependence on international 

trade in goods and services has grown from approximately 5 percent of the gross 

domestic product in the 1960s to about 20 percent. 

The issue that confronts U.S. space policy in regard to economic and commercial 

spacepower is whether any policy that attempts to put the United States in a dominant 

economic role in space will be effective. The above discussion has amply illustrated that 

most such policies have backfired. They have encouraged other nations to invest in 

competitive systems so as to develop and maintain their own independent capabilities in 

space. Although worldwide competition in space infrastructure as well as space-related 

products and services may have many benefits, it does severely limit the amount of 

control any one nation might have on important dual-use technologies in space. 

Economic competition does encourage the development and deployment of new products 

and services, but not all of them may be of domestic origin. However, some U.S. policies, 

such as those that have encouraged the merger of many companies involved in space and 

defense work into an oligopolistic framework, have led to an interesting new economic 

structure where competition is among a few giant firms rather than among many 

providers. It also has led to similar conglomerations of firms abroad. This type of 

competition may not yield the same advantages (particularly to consumers—including the 

government as a purchaser of services) that usually are attributed to true competitive 

industries. 

In summary, for a variety of reasons, the United States cannot return to the space era and 

space policies of the 1960s. It can be and is a leader in space technology, but it is not the 

leader in all aspects of space. Spacepower through commercial prowess is likely to be 

shared among spacefaring nations. Policies aimed at isolation and at protection of 

commercial industries only encourage others to develop similar (and sometimes better) 

products. The only policy that can now be effective in developing a larger and more 

powerful economic competitive engine for space products is one that encourages R&D 

investments by space firms. The introduction of new and more advanced products will 

create a larger global market for the United States. A policy emphasizing offense rather 

than defense would be advantageous for stimulating spacepower through space 

commerce. 
Conclusion 

Economic and commercial spacepower is about market dominance and control. When the 

United States has a monopoly or near-monopoly in space goods or services, control is not 

a problem, and it can dictate (and has done so) to the rest of the world what it was willing 

to sell and provide. History has amply illustrated that this is a short-term phenomenon 

and that, given the value of space technologies to many sectors and to domestic security, 

nations with the ability and resources will develop their own independent capabilities. 

When other nations have similar capabilities, control becomes a problem assuming, as is 

the case with space, that control is also a critical issue in security. Options for control 

through spacepower change and become more limited. Once lost, it is almost impossible 

to regain economic control; therefore, spacepower may revert to issues of bargaining and 

negotiating power and/or military might. 

Exerting spacepower may be inconsistent with expanded commercial developments in 

space, raising investment risks and creating incentives for foreign competitors. At the 

same time, spacepower is highly correlated with increased dual-use government 

purchases of space services as well as with other security issues in space activities. 

Economic investments are made on the basis of expected rates of return. Expanding 

potential market opportunities is one of the prime motivators for private investment. The 

government may be a large customer for commercial goods and services. The economic 

question is whether it is better for a firm to invest in space because there are expanding 

private markets resulting from growth in global opportunities or because of expected 

domestic government sales, primarily for dual-use and security services. 

To the extent that the global market opportunity is denied by restrictive commercial 

policies, spacepower from a purely international economic competitive perspective is 

diminished. As encouraging as the U.S. commercial space policies are in Presidential 

documents over the past 20 years, they have been unintentionally undermined to a large 

extent by other policies. In the United States, security almost always trumps commerce. 

The United States is still the largest investor in space in the world and the technological 

and commercial space leader in many areas. This leadership is being challenged. From an 

economic standpoint alone, it will become increasingly important for the United States to 

stimulate its industry to develop better and less expensive space products in order to 

maintain its competitive position. A strong commercial space industry can and will 

contribute to spacepower. It must be recognized that space is no longer the province of 

one or two strong nations and that other nations will continue to enter the market and 

continuously challenge this leadership. 

Notes
1. The advantage is twofold: it encourages purchases of technical components from the market 

leader, and it gives the market leader a military advantage in understanding the technological 

workings of others' systems. 

2. The police power to ensure a status quo (or improvement) is recognized as an important 

component of a level playing field. For this chapter, the purpose is to isolate economic and 

business arguments from military and security issues. 

3. Even international nongovernmental organizations, such as the European Space Agency, that have 

independently agreed to the principles of the United Nations (UN) Treaties on Outer Space cannot 

make claims for liability directly to a nonmember offending nation or to the UN. They are 

required to make such claims through one of their member nations that has ratified the treaties. 

4. This section is based on a working paper by Henry Hertzfeld and Michel Fouquin, 

"Socioeconomic Conditions and the Space Sector," Organisation for Economic Co-operation and 

Development, Working Paper SG/AU/SPA (2004) 3, May 12, 2004. 

5. See Stanley Fischer, "Globalization and Its Challenges," American Economic Review Papers and 

Proceedings 3, no. 2 (May 2003), 3. 

6. Some actions such as the tightening of visa requirements for entrance to the United States have 

had a definite effect on the number of foreign students in U.S. universities. These actions have 

also made it more difficult for professionals to attend conferences and workshops in the United 

States, both evidence of a slowing of at least some global communications links. Globalization is 

also closely tied to overall economic growth trends. The early 2000s were marked by a slowdown 

in growth that may have temporarily slowed globalization trends. The 9/11 events had a 

particularly strong influence on U.S. policies. It is unclear how much those policies affected other 

nations. 

7. Rawi Abdelal and Adam Segal, "Has Globalization Passed its Peak?" Foreign Affairs 86, no. 1 

(January–February 2007), 103–114. 

8. Even in the European Union, nations have retained jurisdiction over many areas, including 

telecommunications policy. It is important to note the failure of a popular vote on establishing a 

European constitution. 

9. That does not guarantee that the prices charged to customers will necessarily be lower than if the 

industry were competitive (that is, if multiple providers had been offering services to the same 

customers). Economic theory tells us otherwise. Monopoly means higher prices and less quantity 

offered on the market. Regulatory licensing, oversight, and enforcement can compensate for this. 

The trade-off in the case of space is one of avoiding duplication of expensive assets coupled with 

the space-power inherent with a monopoly that is owned by a company within the United States 

and under the supervision of U.S. laws. Arguments that the space sector should be "competitive" 

and respond fully to market prices sound persuasive but fail to recognize the reality that space 

economic activity is, at best, the province of a handful of companies and is beholden to large 

purchases from governments—both factors clearly denying space enterprise from fitting any 

textbook definition of a price-competitive sector. Competition in the space sector has to be viewed 

as a goal, not a reality. 

10. This is because there will be a combination of more satellites serving only one nation or region, 

and there will also be restrictions on sales of services within particular nations and market areas. 

11. The former Soviet Union is the obvious exception to this. Its goals were very similar to those of 

the United States in the space and technological race of the 1960s through the 1980s, but because 

of the socialist nature of the government it did not seek commercial involvement during those 

years. 

12. See, for example, article VII of the European Space Agency Charter, SP–1271(E), March 2003. 

13. Not having an industry policy is, in itself, an industry policy. And in spite of that overall 

philosophy, the United States has provided many specific incentives and subsidies to the 

aerospace industry. For example, the Independent Research and Development funds that are part 

of many Department of Defense research and development contracts to commercial funds provide 

incentive for new commercial technological development. The Export-Import Bank provides loans 

to industry to encourage trade. Import restrictions on some products protect domestic industry. 

And the largest incentive is the sales to the U.S. Government of equipment and services. 

14. National Security Space Project, "Presidential Decisions: NSC Documents," ed. Stephanie Feyock 

and R. Cargill Hall (Washington, DC: George C. Marshall Institute, 2006). This volume (along 
with its supplement) is a collection of all of the unclassified and declassified Presidential 

Decisions on space. That document is the source of the information in this section. 

15. Telecommunications, meteorology, and remote sensing have all been subjects of separate policy 

documents over time. 

16. National Security Council (NSC) 5918/1, "Draft Statement of U.S. Policy on Outer Space," 

December 17, 1959. 

17. Presidential Decision Directive (PDD)/NSC–37, "National Space Policy," May 22, 1978, available 

at <http://fas.org/spp/military/docops/national/nsc-37.htm>. 

18. The exception was telecommunications satellites, which are discussed in separate policy 

documents. 

19. With an operational shuttle, the U.S. Government had adapted two related policies: one was to put 

all commercial U.S. payloads on the shuttle, and the second was to stop performing advanced 

research and development on expendable launch vehicles. After the Challenger accident, it was 

clear that the United States needed both capable expendable vehicles and the shuttle. The 

commercial launch sector was at this point mature enough to manufacture and sell launches of 

expendable vehicles to both the government and private customers. The 1984 Commercial Space 

Launch Act was significantly amended in 1988 to encourage government purchases of launch 

vehicles and licensing of U.S. vehicles for commercial satellite launches rather than having the 

government be the intermediary between the commercial firms and the vehicle manufacturers. 

20. National Security Decision Directive (NSDD)–42, "National Space Policy," July 4, 1982, 

available at <www.hq.nasa.gov/office/pao/History/nsdd-42.html>; NSDD–94, 

"Commercialization of Expendable Launch Vehicles," May 16, 1982, available at 

<www.fas.org/irp/offdocs/nsdd/nsdd-094.htm>; "Fact Sheet: National Space Strategy," August 16, 

1984; and NSDD–254, "United States Space Launch Strategy," December 27, 1986, available at 

<www.fas.org/irp/offdocs/nsdd/nsdd-254.htm>. 

21. One could argue that any commercial venture in any industry might be subject to a similar 

constraint. However, given the dual-use nature of all space activities, along with the history of the 

space industry, this constraint is of a more direct and significant importance for most activities in 

space. 

22. NSDD–30 (National Security Presidential Directive [NSPD]–1), "National Space Policy," 

November 2, 1989, NSPD–4, "National Space Launch Strategy," July 10, 1991, available at 

<http://fas.org/spp/military/docops/national/nspd4.htm>; NSPD–5,"Landsat Remote Sensing 

Strategy,"February 13, 1992, available at <www.au.af.mil/au/awc/awcgate/nspd5.htm>; NSPD–6, 

"Space Exploration Initiative," March 13, 1992, available at 

<http://fas.org/spp/military/docops/national/nspd6.htm>. 

23. PDD/NSC–23, "Statement on Export of Satellite Imagery and Imaging Systems," March 10, 1994. 

24. PDD/National Science and Technology Council (NSTC)–4, "National Space Transportation 

Policy," August 5, 1994, available at <www.fas.org/spp/military/docops/national/launchst.htm>. 

25. PDD/NSTC–6, "U.S. Global Positioning System Policy," March 29, 1996, available at 

<www.fas.org/spp/military/docops/national/gps.htm>. 

26. George W. Bush, "U.S. Commercial Remote Sensing Policy," Section VI, "Foreign Access to U.S. 

Commercial Remote Sensing Space Capabilities," April 25, 2003, available at <http://ostp.gov/ 

html/Fact%20Sheet%20-%20Commercial%20Remote%20Sensing%20Policy%20-%20April%20 

25%202003.pdf>; George W. Bush, "A Renewed Spirit of Discovery: The President's Vision for 

Space Exploration" (Washington, DC: The White House, January 2004), available at 

<http://ostp.gov/html/ renewed_spirit.pdf>; "Fact Sheet: U.S. Space-Based Positioning, 

Navigation, and Timing Policy," December 15, 2004, Background, §II; "Fact Sheet: U.S. Space 

Transportation Policy," January 6, 2005, available at 

<http://ostp.gov/html/Space_Transportation_Policy05.pdf>, U.S. National Space Policy, August 

31, 2006. 

27. This is particularly important for the purchase of communications bandwidth as well as for Earth 

observation imagery. In addition, there are many scientific and meteorology satellites that 

provided data that are shared with many nations and are important for U.S. security as well. 

28. Today, remote sensing, navigation, transportation, and NASA's "vision" are all enumerated in 

separate policy documents. The administration's overall space policy addresses general issues and 

direction, as well as topics not dealt with in the separate policy documents. 
29. The brief summary in this paper is based on information in David J. Whalen, "Communications 

Satellites: Making the Global Village Possible," available at 

<www.hq.nasa.gov/office/pao/History/ satcomhistory.html>, and in Joseph Pelton, "The History 

of Satellite Communications," in Exploring the Unknown, ed. John M. Logsdon (Washington, DC: 

National Aeronautics and Space Administration, SP–4407, 1998). It is also interesting to note that 

the most profitable private use of satellites has changed and is now in the broadcast of direct-tohome television. Technology has changed and cop-per-wire cables have been superseded by fiber 

optic cables, which now carry the majority of voice communications, although they cannot serve 

point-to-multipoint transmissions as effectively as satellites. The U.S. Department of Defense, in 

addition to having its own communications satellites, also purchases a large amount of bandwidth 

from private satellite providers. 

30. Reproduced in Pelton, Exploring the Unknown, 91. 

31. M. Bigner and J. Vanderkerckhove, "The Ariane Programme," Philosophical Transactions of the 

Royal Society of London A312, no. 1519; "Technology in the 1990s: The Industrialization of 

Space" (July 26, 1984), 83–88, available at 

<http://links.jstor.org/sici?sici=00804614%2819840726%29312%3 

A1519%3C83%3ATAP%5BD%3E2.0.CO%3B2-A>. 

32. See below for a brief discussion of the remote sensing industry and the navigation space sector. In 

both cases, subsequent to the telecommunications experience, Europe (led by France) developed, 

launched, and successfully operated a competitive remote sensing system (Spot) and is actively 

engaged in a competitive navigation system (Galileo). 

33. A full analysis of this issue is far too lengthy and complex for this chapter but would be a useful 

topic for further research. 

34. Given the overall maturity of parts of the space industry and the very obvious advantages of 

having space systems, foreign technological and economic development of competing systems is 

inevitable and advantageous in many cases. However, the argument given above relates to 

unilateral U.S. actions that have created unusually strong incentives for foreign development of 

competing systems and resulted in a competitive disadvantage for U.S. industry. 

35. A hint of the effects might be found in the telecommunications sector where COMSAT as the U.S. 

monopoly representative to Intelsat was supposed to do advanced telecommunications research 

and development (R&D). After COMSAT was formed, the government did not fund much new 

basic research in that area. However, COMSAT, as a private company, had other research 

objectives, mainly developing new products rather than doing more fundamental R&D. NASA, 

with great political difficulty, finally did establish a new R&D program in telecommunications 

(the Advanced Communications Technology Satellite program) in the 1980s to attempt to catch up 

to other nations that had continued government funding in that area. 

36. See discussion of the French-German Symphonie satellite above. 
Chapter 6:

The Commercial Space Industry: A Critical Spacepower Consideration

Joseph Fuller, Jr., Jeffrey Foust, Chad Frappier, Dustin Kaiser, and David Vaccaro

<hr size=2 width="100%" align=center> 

Spacepower is a function of multiple factors including military, civil, and commercial 

space capabilities. Without considering all three capabilities, formulation of thought on 

spacepower would fall short of reality. The commercial space industry is an evolving part 

of global space activity and is driving innovative technologies and applications in 

conjunction with government missions. It is critical to understand the major 

characteristics of the commercial space market, not only because the size of the industry 

and its technical applications have a great effect on the global economy, but also because 

the assets and services of commercial space are often used by government customers.

Two major industry themes exist that affect issues of national interest. First is the 

interdependence between commercial industry and government space. Without the 

activities of one, the other would be operationally deficient. A second theme is the 

existence of government incentives and impediments that influence the landscape of the 

commercial space industry and its contributions to national goals. These themes will be 

examined in this chapter.

The following sections provide insight into the space industry and activity in the 

commercial market for space products and services. The commercial industry, although 

an interconnected whole, is defined by four major components: satellite services, satellite 

manufacturing, launch services, and ground equipment. Breaking down the industry by 

sector provides a better understanding of the major trends and wide-ranging components 

that make up commercial space. An explanation of market activity, major players, and 

other critical characteristics of each sector is provided, followed by an outlook for the 

future commercial space industry and its implications for spacepower.

Historical Overview

Aerospace and other companies have been involved in the space industry since the 

beginning of the space age, initially as contractors to government programs. However, 

the commercial space industry did not emerge in its current recognizable form until the 

1980s. Growing demand for satellite communications, particularly television 

broadcasting, provided new business for satellite manufacturers and led to the creation of 

new companies to provide satellite services. At the same time, changes in U.S. national 

space policy in the wake of the space shuttle Challenger accident, as well as the 

emergence of competition from Europe's Ariane launch vehicle, stimulated the 

development of a domestic commercial launch industry.
The commercial space industry continued to grow through the 1990s, in part due to 

increasing demand for broadcasting and other communications services, but also because 

companies sought to branch out into other areas, from mobile communications to remote 

sensing. This growth, fueled by billions of dollars of investment in new ventures such as 

Globalstar, Iridium, and Teledesic, created optimistic forecasts for continued future 

expansion into the next decade and led to investment in new commercial launch ventures, 

including companies that planned to develop reusable launch vehicles that would greatly 

reduce the cost of space access. However, by 2000, many of these new ventures were 

struggling: new communications companies found it difficult to compete with low-cost 

terrestrial alternatives, deterring other ventures from starting up and causing a ripple 

effect that reduced demand for satellite manufacturing and launch services. The industry 

retrenched for several years, falling back on its core, relatively mature satellite 

communications markets. However, entrepreneurs continue to explore new commercial 

space markets, with suborbital and orbital space tourism now one of the leading areas of 

interest.

Industry Sectors: Satellite Services

Market Overview

The satellite services sector refers to communications and remote sensing provided by 

commercially owned or operated satellites. Three categories define the sector, based upon 

the type of service being offered: fixed satellite service, mobile satellite service, and 

direct broadcast service. These categories include lease and purchase agreements for onorbit transponders, retail or subscription services (such as direct-to-home [DTH] 

television and digital audio radio service), and commercial satellite remote sensing.

Since the earliest stages of the space age, commercial companies have provided services 

through the satellites they own or operate. In the early 1960s, the first satellite 

communications systems for commercial use were developed. The Telstar program 

produced the first active communications satellite, launched in 1962, that was developed 

using government-industry cooperation between the National Aeronautics and Space 

Administration (NASA) and AT&T. In 1965, the first commercial communications 

satellite was launched, the Communications Satellite Corporation's Early Bird, which 

acted as a line-of-sight communications repeater between North America and Europe. 

This satellite demonstrated the feasibility of geosynchronous satellite communications, 

which is the mainstay of the satellite services sector today. Satellite operators have 

proliferated worldwide and provide satellite communications capabilities in nearly every 

part of the globe while developing innovative technologies that expand available services.

Commercial satellite remote sensing operators have also developed a presence in many 

parts of the world and have continually improved satellite imagery services. Growth in 

this market has not been as significant as in communications. Remote sensing providers 

serve the geospatial information services market and supply overhead intelligence to 

governments worldwide.
The satellite services sector is larger than any other sector in the commercial space 

industry and has experienced sustained growth from 2002 through 2007. As figure 6–1 

shows, estimated worldwide revenues earned by satellite service providers grew from 

2000 to 2005, despite increasing global deregulation that has increased price competition, 

resulting in decreasing revenues per transponder during this period.1

Figure 6–1. World Satellite Services Revenue by Service Type, 2002-2007

Regulation plays a significant role in shaping the satellite services sector. The industry is 

licensed by regimes that differ according to the type of service provided and the 

geographical location of the company or of the service provided. Individual countries 

have the responsibility to allocate bandwidth and regulate the use of particular satellites 

within national borders (or landing rights) in the communications and remote sensing 

sectors. In the United States, the Federal Communications Commission regulates satellite 

communications, while the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration in the 

Department of Commerce regulates commercial satellite remote sensing operators. Two 

documents that provide the foundation of regulatory guidance in the United States are the 

Communications Satellite Act of 1962 and the 1992 Land Remote Sensing Policy Act.

Similarly, other countries have regulatory entities that levy rules on commercial service 

providers within their jurisdiction. Because regulatory regimes vary from country to 

country, this creates additional complexity and potential difficulty for companies seeking 

allocated bandwidth and landing rights in a given country.

Key Satellite Service Providers
The satellite services sector is composed of numerous global and regional companies 

providing various services to most regions of the world. Select companies with the 

greatest impact on the market for different types of services are listed in table 6–1. The 

services are an integral part of personal and business activity globally, as well as 

government communications and intelligence collection. For this reason, commercial 

satellite assets are critical infrastructure that promote economic growth, sustain well 

being, and enhance security.

Table 6–1. Significant Worldwide Satellite Services Companies

The size of this sector, in terms of worldwide revenues by satellite services companies, 

exceeded $70 billion in 2007. Companies based in the United States play a significant 

role in this sector: about 45 percent of 2007 revenue can be attributed to U.S. companies 

(see figure 6–2).Moreover, from 2002 to 2007, these U.S. companies maintained a 

relatively steady percentage of all satellite services revenue, ranging a low of 39 percent 

to a high of 49 percent in 2007.2

Figure 6–2. World versus U.S. Satellite Services Revenue, 2002-2007
In addition to the companies that own and operate satellites, private equity firms are 

playing an increasingly important role in this sector. This trend is particularly the case in 

the U.S. market; the effect of private equity in the sector varies by location. Private equity 

firms are purchasing satellite assets at an increasing pace, which could potentially affect 

the future landscape of the entire industry. The long-term nature of satellite planning is in 

conflict with the short-term business nature of the private equity planning horizon. 

Absent the traditional longer term technology development focus, this could affect the 

procurement of future satellites if there is insufficient attention to recapitalization and 

investment in physical assets. In this case, the business environment of commercial 

services could affect whether there is sufficient capacity available to government and 

nongovernmental customers.

Industry Sectors: Satellite Manufacturing

Market Overview

The commercial satellite manufacturing sector, historically dominated by a handful of 

American and European firms, has diversified both geographically and technologically in 

the past decade. A host of Asia-Pacific companies has entered the market. Meanwhile, 

European companies have partnered to take advantage of market opportunities created by 

U.S. export regulations, which are generally perceived to have precipitated a decline in 

the U.S. share of the market. Established and new satellite manufacturers, both in the 

United States and abroad, have sought competitive advantages in technologies such as 

small satellites, customizable modular bus designs into which standardized interoperable 

payload components can be inserted according to the desired function of the satellite 

(known as plug-and-play modular buses), and advanced remote sensing, imagery, and

communications instrumentation. 

One driving force behind this internationalization and specialization of the satellite 

manufacturing sector has been the changing levels of demand.Traced over the past 

decade (1999–2008), the financial performance of the satellite manufacturing sectors 

forms a U-curve:a marked decline, a period of leveling, followed by a resurgence.In the 

late 1990s, surging Internet usage and the need for increasingly sophisticated, globally 

available communications services fueled expectations that many fleets of new satellites 

would be needed. Instead, the telecom bubble burst, and satellite manufacturers have 

since competed for a limited number of contracts. Non-geosynchronous orbit (NGSO) 

communications ventures such as Globalstar and Iridium experienced financial failures 

and both underwent extensive restructuring before returning to their current operational 

status.During this period, geosynchronous Earth orbit (GEO) commercial providers 

ordered fewer replacement satellites, opting instead to consolidate their fleets and to 

invest only in maintaining or replacing spacecraft as required to preserve their current 

constellations.However, after several years of shrinking demand, beginning in 2006, 

satellite manufacturing revenues began to rebound.After falling from $11 billion in 2002 

to $7.8 billion in 2005, satellite manufacturing revenues rose sharply to $12 billion in 

2006.This trend was sustained in 2007 with satellite manufacturing revenues of $11.6 

billion recorded.
Importantly, the slight drop between 2006 and 2007 was due not to fewer satellites being 

produced for launch but rather to the decrease in the average mass of the satellites 

launched in 2007.This highlights another trend in the satellite manufacturing market, the 

growing importance of small satellites, or smallsats, which will be discussed later in this 

section (see figure 6–3).3

Figure 6–3. Worldwide Satellite Manufacturing Revenues, 2002-2007

Despite the recent resurgence in satellite manufacturing revenues, the deep global 

recession that began in 2008 and continued in early 2009 will likely impact the satellite 

manufacturing sector. There is typically a period of many months, often extending to 

years, between completion of a satellite manufacturing contract and delivery of the 

satellite. This gap means satellite manufacturers usually have a backlog of contracts. 

When the recession began, satellites manufacturers were building spacecraft ordered 

before the global downturn; many had very high backlogs in late 2008 and early 2009. 

The duration of the recession can create a risk that fewer new satellite orders will be 

placed overall, despite the ability of some major players to accelerate purchases 

opportunistically during this period of market contraction. For this reason and the 

ongoing difficulties in the credit markets, satellite manufacturing could suffer from a 

delayed recession impact, leading to a potential contraction in manufacturing revenues in 

2010 and beyond. 
In response to this tightening market, manufacturers in China, India, and other Asian 

countries have sought to compete on a price basis. Asian manufacturers benefit from a 

large pool of skilled low-cost labor and maintain considerable, but nontransparent, 

collaborative relationships with government-funded space agencies and science institutes 

in their home countries. These factors keep costs low and create mechanisms for 

leveraging public sector research and development resources toward commercial ends, 

enabling Asian manufacturers to offer satellite buses on the world market at 

comparatively lower rates.

Meanwhile, U.S. companies, stimulated partly by government-sponsored responsive 

space and other initiatives, have pursued a technological edge. They have invested in 

facilities to develop smallsats, which can offer the same functionality as larger satellites 

at a fraction of the cost. Interest in smallsats has also prompted U.S. manufacturers to 

explore plug-and-play technology.

The global market has been slower to adopt the smallsat concept, and despite the 

technical advances, U.S. manufacturers have experienced declining market share since 

the beginning of the decade. In 2000, 51 percent of worldwide satellite manufacturing 

revenues went to U.S. companies. By 2007, this proportion had decreased to 41 percent. 

The industry consensus is that a significant portion of this decline has been caused by 

U.S. Department of State International Traffic in Arms Regulations (ITAR) controls, 

which make it difficult and sometimes impossible for U.S. manufacturers to build 

satellites for or provide components to foreign clients.

The application of ITAR regulations has become a subject of consternation in this U.S. 

commercial space sector. From component suppliers to bus providers and payload 

integration companies, all tiers of the American satellite manufacturing sector have seen 

their global market potential reduced by ITAR restrictions. As American firms have 

explored state-of-the-art technologies to gain a market advantage, European, Russian, and 

other international firms have specialized by marketing satellites that are not subject to 

ITAR controls. These export control rules, which were designed to protect U.S. 

technology, have created a market based solely on avoidance of the controls. Among the 

most prominent examples is the case of Chinasat-8, a communications satellite serving 

the China Satellite Communications Corporation (Chinasat) of Beijing. In 1998, Loral 

Space and Communications, a U.S. manufacturer, completed construction of Chinasat-8 

but was prevented by ITAR rules from exporting it for launch aboard a Chinese Long 

March vehicle. The satellite remained in storage for 6 years while Loral sought export 

approval from the Department of State. Loral's efforts were ultimately unsuccessful. As a 

result, Chinasat awarded a $145-million manufacturing contract for the follow-on 

satellite, Chinasat-9, to Alcatel Alenia Space (now Thales Alenia Space), a European 

company not subject to ITAR. Thales Alenia has meanwhile also taken the lead in 

developing an "ITAR-free" satellite whose components are supplied wholly by 

manufacturers outside the United States. Similar collaborations among international 

satellite manufacturers in this market space were in various stages of progress as of early 

2009.
Cases like Chinasat-8 have prompted a consensus among American satellite 

manufacturers that by disadvantaging U.S. firms in the global marketplace, ITAR rules 

harm the national interest more than help it. However, others continue to cite the need to 

limit technology transfers to possible adversaries. It is important to consider that, now, 

there are non–U.S. companies providing the international market with technology of 

equal or better quality than U.S. technology. Against this backdrop of foreign 

competition and dual-use issues, the debate continues over how best to balance American 

commercial and security interests as they pertain to satellite manufacturing.

Key Satellite Manufacturers

Five companies currently dominate the commercial satellite manufacturing sector: The 

Boeing Company, Lockheed Martin Commercial Space Systems, and Space 

Systems/Loral in the United States; and Alcatel Alenia Space and EADS Astrium in 

Europe. Together, these companies have won approximately three-fourths of announced 

GEO commercial payload manufacturing contracts in the past decade. The remaining 

contracts were distributed among a handful of smaller players: Orbital Sciences 

Corporation in the United States; Khrunichev State Research and Production Space 

Center, NPO PM, and Energiya in Russia; Mitsubishi Electric in Japan; and the Chinese 

Academy of Space Technology (CAST).

In addition to commercial GEO satellite contracts, a number of companies manufacture 

NGSO satellites as well as GEO satellites whose contracts are not openly competed on 

the commercial market. Other U.S. satellite manufacturers include Northrop Grumman 

Corporation, Aero Astro, Ball Aerospace, General Dynamics, and several firms 

specializing in small satellites, such as Instarsat, Microsat Systems, SpaceDev, and 

Swales Aerospace.

Beyond Thales Alenia and EADS, Europe is also home to smaller satellite manufacturers. 

Two significant smaller manufacturers are Germany's OHB–System AG and Britain's 

Surrey Satellite Technology Ltd., one of the world's foremost smallsat builders. Like 

American firms, European satellite manufacturers often partner and subcontract with one 

another. Unlike American firms, European manufacturers are not subject to ITAR 

restrictions, enabling them to collaborate more easily with firms abroad. While European 

manufacturers are subject to some export controls, European Union rules are not as strict 

as those of its U.S. counterparts. This has allowed collaboration with Russian and other 

international firms, including a 2005 accord between EADS Astrium and Antrix, the 

commercial arm of the Indian Space Research Organization, to jointly address the 

commercial market.

In Asia, Japanese companies such as Nippon Electric Corporation and Mitsubishi were 

for many years the only satellite manufacturing market contenders. But in the past 

decade, Chinese and Indian firms have emerged. In addition to producing a steady flow 

of payloads for Chinese government and commercial purposes, CAST has contracted to 

build satellites for the Venezuelan and Nigerian governments and has established ties 

with Thales Alenia to cooperate in addressing the satellite export market. India's Antrix is 
pursuing a similar path, building satellites for domestic Indian clients while enhancing its 

focus on international customers. The success in February 2006 of the joint EADS 

Astrium-Antrix bid to manufacture the Eutelsat W2M communications satellite marked 

India's first major international satellite manufacturing contract. China and India are 

positioning themselves to compete primarily on a cost basis. If satellite demand begins to 

stagnate or decline due to the current recession, the price advantages both countries can 

offer may prove decisive in a tightening market.

Finally, a collection of other international satellite manufacturers occupies small niches 

within the market. Israel Aircraft Industries and Elbit Systems together manufacture 

sophisticated remote sensing satellites for Israeli military use. Iran is seeking to build a 

similar indigenous satellite capability via Shahid Hemmat 1G, a government-funded 

manufacturer about which little information is known. In South America, Argentina's 

INVAP, a research incubator sponsored by the government, has attempted to foster a 

national commercial satellite manufacturing industry with little success thus far. The 

Korean Aerospace Research Institute has pursued the same goal in South Korea, but 

despite these efforts, that country has not yet joined China and India as a contender in the 

commercial satellite manufacturing marketplace. Finally, Canada's MacDonald, 

Dettwiler, and Associates is seeking to enhance its payload manufacturing offerings.

Satellite Technologies and Trends

Small satellites are a key emerging technology area in the satellite manufacturing sector. 

The ability to conduct functions currently handled by larger satellites using smaller, 

lighter payloads promises to increase payload versatility while reducing manufacturing 

and launch costs. While smallsats promise advantages due to their launch and operational 

flexibility, their strategic value has not yet been demonstrated in operational scenarios. 

The U.S. military has funded the building and test launch of several smallsats, and 

numerous universities worldwide have designed 1-kilogram cube-shaped satellites for 

similar experimental missions. These have been used mainly for technology development 

rather than commercial applications. While there will continue to be military, scientific, 

and nonprofit interest in smallsat technologies, the manufacturing tempo of small 

satellites appears unlikely to increase significantly until their commercial viability has 

been demonstrated.

Other satellite technologies under development also have strategic implications. Several 

U.S. and international satellite manufacturers continue to produce intelligence, 

surveillance, and reconnaissance satellites. More recent models of these satellites feature 

technologies such as synthetic aperture radar, which allow satellites to analyze ground 

images despite interference from low light and cloud cover, and high-resolution cameras 

and imagers. Meanwhile, the U.S. global positioning system (GPS) constellation and 

other navigation systems programs are seeking to bolster future satellites with advanced 

positioning, navigation, and timing technologies. These technologies will increase the 

overall accuracy of the satellite navigation systems they serve—including a diverse array 

of critical military, commercial, and civil applications. Other technologies will be applied 
to space surveillance, situational awareness space asset defense, and possibly offensive 

counterspace.

Despite these high value-added technology developments, the satellite manufacturing 

sector now contributes proportionately less to the overall economic valuation of the 

commercial space industry than it did at the beginning of the decade (see figure 6–4). In 

2000, revenues from the satellite manufacturing sector constituted 18 percent of 

worldwide space industry revenues. By 2007, the proportion had shrunk to 9 percent.4

Figure 6–4. Composition of Worldwide Space Industry Revenues, 2002

Given these market dynamics, the satellite manufacturing sector will likely face growing 

pressures to adapt to a tightening market in the 2010 timeframe and beyond. Although 

government requirements will continue to generate demand for new satellites and satellite 

technologies, the ongoing recession suggests that the recent rebound in the satellite 

manufacturing sector might be short-lived. The sector appears poised to enter another 

period of change in which satellite manufacturers with the most diverse portfolios of 

satellite hardware offerings and capabilities will likely benefit from comparative 

advantages over their counterparts. 

Industry Sectors: Launch Services

Launch Market Overview
Commercial payloads have created demand for launch services since the early 

communications satellites of the 1960s. Initially, those launches were provided by 

government organizations, such as NASA. By the 1980s, a commercial launch industry 

had emerged with the rise of Arianespace, the European company that markets launches 

of the Ariane launch vehicle family, and the 1986 decision by President Ronald Reagan 

to move commercial and many government payloads from the space shuttle to 

expendable launch vehicles intensified these developments. Competition increased in the 

1990s with the introduction of the Chinese Long March and various Russian vehicles to 

the global market.

The commercial launch sector has experienced wide variations in activity in the last 10 

years (see figure 6–5). In the latter half of the 1990s, commercial launch activity surged 

primarily because of the launch of a growing number of GEO communications satellites, 

as well as the deployment of three low Earth orbit (LEO) communications systems: 

Globalstar, Iridium, and ORBCOMM. However, after the telecommunications boom 

ended in 2000 and the LEO satellite operators filed for bankruptcy protection, launch 

activity dropped precipitously. Forecasts for launch activity through the middle of the 

next decade, as generated by the U.S. Federal Aviation Administration's (FAA's) Office 

of Commercial Space Transportation and the Commercial Space Transportation Advisory 

Committee, do not foresee a return to the peak levels of the late 1990s, although launch 

activity is projected to remain above the early 2000s nadir, in part because of efforts to 

replace the original LEO satellite constellations with new generations of spacecraft (see 

figure 6–6).5

Figure 6–5. Composition of Worldwide Space Industry Revenues, 2007
Figure 6–6. Worldwide Commercial Launches, 1999-2008

Translating launch activity into revenue for the industry has been notoriously difficult 

because of the lack of independently verifiable pricing data. Launch services providers, 

with rare exceptions, do not publish prices for either individual launch contracts or 

vehicles in general. Anecdotal data suggest that launch prices have varied considerably in 

the last decade, falling early in the decade because of considerable oversupply in the 

market but later recovering somewhat because of an increase in demand and short-term 

supply constraints. By early 2009, there was some evidence of a renewed decline in 

launch prices, at least by some launch providers. Figure 6–7 provides an approximation 

of launch services revenue, based on FAA-approved estimates of commercial launch 

prices.

Figure 6–7. Commercial Launch Forecast, 2009-2018
From 1999 to 2008, the U.S. share of the global commercial launch market significantly 

declined. The United States held a de facto monopoly on the commercial market prior to 

the entry of Arianespace in the 1980s and maintained a significant share of this market 

through much of the 1990s.The U.S. share of the commercial launch market fell 

significantly this decade, however, and has declined even more in recent years (see figure 

6–8). Much of the decline has to do with price: while individual purchase decisions are 

not especially price sensitive (since the cost of launch is only a fraction of the overall cost 

to build and deploy a large commercial GEO communications satellite), non–U.S. launch 

vehicles on the market have proven to be both equally reliable and less expensive, 

providing better service to commercial customers.One U.S. company, Space Exploration 

Technologies (SpaceX), is attempting to reverse this trend with its Falcon line of launch 

vehicle that can launch spacecraft at prices significantly below not just other U.S.–built 

vehicles, but international competitors as well. 

Figure 6–8. Estimated Worldwide Commercial Launch Revenues, 1999-2008
Key Launch Service Players

Three providers currently dominate the commercial launch services market. Arianespace, 

a French company, provides the Ariane 5 launch vehicle, the only vehicle that offers 

dual-manifesting for large GEO satellites. Arianespace is also now selling launches on 

the Russian-built Soyuz rocket, which will begin flights out of the European spaceport in 

Kourou, French Guiana, in 2010. Sea Launch is a multinational venture led by a U.S. 

company, Boeing, and includes companies from Ukraine, Russia, and Norway. It offers 

flights on the Zenit-3SL, a Ukrainian-built launch vehicle with a Russian upper stage that 

is launched from a mobile launch platform on the Equator in the Pacific Ocean to 

maximize its performance. A version of the same vehicle, designated Zenit-3SLB, 

entered service in 2008 from the Baykonur cosmodrome in Kazakhstan under the Land 

Launch brand.

International Launch Services (ILS) formed in 1995 as a joint venture between Lockheed 

Martin, Khrunichev, and Energiya. It originally sold commercial launches on the Atlas 

family of vehicles and the Proton. In October 2006, Lockheed sold its majority stake in 

ILS to a new venture, Space Transport, and retained commercial marketing rights for the 

Atlas 5. Space Transport sold its stake in ILS to Khrunichev in 2008. ILS continues to 

offer the Proton and plans to offer its eventual successor, the Angara, once it enters 

service.

Boeing withdrew the Delta 4 vehicle from the commercial market in 2003, citing poor 

market conditions, but continues to sell the smaller Delta 2 commercially for launches of 

NGSO spacecraft, such as commercial remote sensing satellites. Lockheed Martin offers 
only the Atlas 5 commercially, having retired older variants of the Atlas family earlier in 

the decade. SpaceX successfully flew its small Falcon 1 launch vehicle in 2008 and plans 

to launch the larger Falcon 9 for the first time in 2009.

Several companies also offer smaller launch vehicles intended for NGSO 

communications and remote sensing satellites as well as government spacecraft whose 

launches are procured commercially. These companies include U.S.-based Orbital 

Sciences Corporation, which offers the Pegasus and Taurus; Eurockot, a German-Russian 

joint venture that markets the Russian-built Rockot; and Kosmotras, a Russian company 

that offers the Dnepr, a converted SS–18 intercontinental ballistic missile. Arianespace 

also plans to market the Vega small launch vehicle currently under development by the 

European Space Agency (ESA).

Several other countries are interested in entering or reentering the commercial launch 

market. China, which offered commercial launches on its Long March family of boosters 

through 2000, exited the market when U.S. export control changes made the transfer of 

satellites to China for launch effectively impossible. China hopes to be able to reenter the 

market by providing launches for so-called ITAR-free satellites being developed by 

European manufacturers, notably Thales Alenia Space, and has won several launch 

contracts for such spacecraft in the last few years. Japan has expressed an interest in 

making its H–2A vehicle available to commercial customers. India has sold one 

commercial launch on its Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle to the Italian space agency for a 

small astronomy satellite and is seeking commercial orders for its larger Geosynchronous 

Satellite Launch Vehicle.

Suborbital launch services have traditionally been limited primarily to government 

markets, from scientific research to missile defense development. However, there has 

been renewed interest in commercial suborbital spaceflight, primarily for the emerging 

personal spaceflight (better known as space tourism) industry. SpaceShipOne, a piloted 

reusable suborbital spacecraft built by Scaled Composites, won the $10-million Ansari X 

Prize in 2004, helping generate interest in this market. Virgin Galactic has licensed the 

SpaceShipOne technology and is working with Scaled Composites to develop SpaceShip 

Two, which is beginning flight tests in 2009 Other entrants in this field include Armadillo 

Aerospace, Rocketplane Global, and XCOR Aerospace in the United States; PlanetSpace, 

a joint U.S.-Canadian venture; and Starchaser Ltd. in the United Kingdom.

Industry Sectors: Ground Equipment

Market Overview

Satellite ground equipment is an important component in the provision of satellite 

services. In the early days of satellite communications, ground equipment consisted of 

dishes dozens of feet in diameter supported by rooms filled with electronics, requiring 

budgets in the millions of dollars to build, maintain, and operate. Present-day 

technologies, such as very small aperture terminals (VSATs), miniaturized antennas, and 

microelectronics, have made DTH television and Internet services and satellite phones 
affordable and useful to a wide range of users. In the future, advanced technologies such 

as laser links and conformal array antennas will bring new capabilities to commercial and 

defense applications alike.

Ground equipment includes a broad array of devices and components used for satellite 

communications. Ground equipment can be divided into three major categories: Earth 

stations, VSATs, and consumer electronics. Earth station components include the 

equipment required for uplinking and downlinking transmissions to and from satellites 

and the equipment required to control satellites on orbit. Earth stations usually utilize 

large aperture satellite dishes capable of high bandwidth data transmission. VSATs 

provide businesses and other relatively high bandwidth users with flexible, transportable, 

and cost-effective satellite communications. Consumer electronics include devices 

employed by end users to receive satellite services for both mobile and fixed applications. 

In addition, GPS devices are also a part of this sector, using the military satellite signals 

for positioning by a varied user group. Table 6–2 describes these market segments and 

their applications. 

Table 6–2. Ground Equipment Market Segments

The large number of countries involved in producing ground equipment makes this 

segment of the space industry a truly global market. Hundreds of companies from many 
countries produce the wide variety of electronic components required to manufacture 

Earth stations and consumer electronics. The United States was expected to manufacture 

roughly 20 percent of the approximately 5,300 Earth stations that were to be produced in 

2007.6

Revenues from the sale of ground equipment have grown for the last 8 years (see figure 

6–9). Sales of ground equipment grew by over 19 percent during 2007 versus 2006. The 

biggest driver of this revenue growth is end-user equipment, particularly for key 

consumer services: satellite radio and DTH television. While prices for some ground 

equipment, such as VSATs, continue to decline, prices for consumer service–related 

hardware, such as satellite radio receivers, are increasing as new technology and 

capabilities are introduced.

Figure 6–9. Commercial Launch Market Share by Country, 1997-2001

Importance of Ground Equipment for National Security

Satellite ground equipment is an important component in the provision of satellite 

services for the military and other security personnel. Low-cost commercial-off-the-shelf 

satellite communications and navigation ground equipment has been effectively utilized 

by blue forces and enemy combatants in recent conflicts around the globe. These 
technologies also provide necessary support in homeland defense and crisis response 

situations, particularly when terrestrial technology options are hampered by the crisis 

situation. Users at the Federal (both military and nonmilitary agencies), state, local, 

corporate, and individual levels are all beneficiaries of advances in the commercial 

satellite ground equipment sector, though they must consider issues of communications 

interoperability to best use the technology. The development and deployment of 

advanced satellite ground equipment such as laser links and conformal array antennas 

could provide warfighters and crisis responders with increasingly decisive command, 

control, communications, and intelligence capabilities in the future.

The Next Space Age: A Commercial Space Paradigm

The world may already be witnessing the arrival of the next space age. Increased 

acceptance of high-risk commercial space business ventures as an element within an 

investment portfolio is one beginning. Space adventures such as personal spaceflight and 

the launch of private space habitats are another. The U.S. Government's commitment to 

purchase commercially produced space goods and services is yet another. Assuming 

success, these transformational changes will create new services and capabilities and 

greater interdependence among users, and thereby enhanced spacepower. 

If these are indicators of a transition into the next space age, what signs might confirm 

the existence of a new paradigm for commercial space? How will the world know that its 

model of space commerce has permanently changed? Are such changes now observable? 

While the future is difficult to predict, certain observations might confirm a new 

paradigm. 

One of the first signs of the new space age may be the way that space-related goods and 

services have become seamlessly integrated as a critical part of the human experience. 

Communications, navigation, weather, and satellite imagery are current applications 

affecting how people live on a daily basis. As barriers to entry fall and new space 

applications continue to increase our quality of life, the acceptance of space commerce as 

an investment opportunity, a business, and a career will become a naturally occurring 

human experience.

In the next space age, the commercial space industry will be an integral component of 

defense and civil space initiatives. Communications, GPS, weather, and remote sensing 

satellites are prominent examples of the growing interdependence identified in this 

chapter. Governments and private operators will seek to leverage commercially and 

strategically valuable space products and services. Whether private or government, space 

developers will consider all users in systems design and operations. 

Also in the next space age, space technology will be ubiquitous and produced by many 

nations. The global manufacturing of satellite ground equipment is an example of what 

will exist more broadly in the next space age. Many of the current space-capable nations 

view themselves as commercial suppliers of space goods and services. New foreign space 

powers will utilize space in increasingly complex ways, creating competition for 
established space powers and for each other in a global economy. This competition will 

drive technology development, reduce prices, improve capabilities, decrease risk, and 

improve value for consumers.

Several actions must be sustained to continue to encourage and facilitate transition to a 

new commercial space paradigm. Government research and development, as well as 

funding for industry, serve as rich sources of technology and inspiration for entrepreneurs 

and must continue. After the first few nonclassical commercial space ventures succeed 

financially, transition to a new paradigm will accelerate, paving the way for new 

commercial opportunities.

As for assurance of success, the numbers favor a breakthrough. A large number of truly 

bold private business ventures currently exist. Furthermore, this is a global, not just an 

American, phenomenon. Commercial space is a largely unexplored and untapped 

frontier. However, the explorers and investors currently considering space ventures may 

not be the first to succeed; they have been preceded by the industry's pioneers who have 

already committed to advance into the next space age.

Future Projections and Implications for Spacepower

Since the beginning of this decade, the four broad sectors that together compose the 

commercial space industry—satellite services, satellite manufacturing, launch services, 

and ground equipment—have experienced market fluctuations that are related. The 

bursting of the 1990s telecommunications bubble proved to be a seminal event that 

adversely impacted all four market segments and whose effects continue to linger. The 

telecommunications downturn shattered expectations that demand for satellite services 

would grow indefinitely. This led to fewer new satellites being ordered than widely 

projected at the beginning of the decade, which has resulted in more competition for 

fewer contracts in the satellite manufacturing industry. Fewer satellite orders have meant 

fewer launches needed, causing a decline in the launch services sector relative to the late 

1990s. And the resulting general stagnation in all of these areas has reduced future 

demand projections in the ground equipment segment to a certain extent. A new 

generation of financial owners also emerged, and their business decisions coupled with 

the slower market growth have also contributed to this market conservatism.

However, following an industry-wide shakeout, the worldwide commercial space 

industry has rebounded. Between 2002 and 2007, worldwide space industry revenues 

grew by 73 percent, from $71 billion to $123 billion. The explanation for this surprising 

growth lies in the satellite services and ground equipment segments. Although satellite 

services have not grown at the meteoric pace envisioned during the telecommunications 

heyday of the late 1990s, global Internet, DTH television, telephony, and data usage have 

continued to grow steadily, fueling solid demand that has boosted revenues each year. 

The value of the satellite services industry nearly doubled between 2002 and 2007, 

increasing from $35.6 billion to $73.9 billion. This steady growth has also increased the 

relative weight of satellite services as a component of the overall space industry. Satellite 
services accounted for 51 percent of industry revenue in 2002 but grew to 60 percent by 

2007.7

Demand for satellite services, in turn, has sustained the growth of the ground equipment 

sector. Consumer demand for electronics to receive satellite radio and DTH video 

services has enabled the ground equipment sector to grow consistently each year in this 

decade thus far. In 2002, revenues for the ground equipment sector totaled $21 billion, 

increasing to $34.3 billion by 2007—an increase of 63 percent. This rapid growth in the 

satellite services and ground equipment markets has offset the comparative declines in 

the satellite manufacturing and launch services markets. As the former two markets have 

become linchpins for the sustained revenue growth of the space industry, the latter two 

have become relatively less of a factor, shrinking from 20 percent of total industry 

revenue in 2002 to 12 percent in 2007.8

The worldwide recession that began in 2008 and continues in 2009 will likely have an 

adverse, but delayed, impact on the commercial space industry.In the short term, 

backlogs from order completed prior to the recession can sustain the launch and satellite 

manufacturing industries.Meanwhile, satellite services and ground equipment will have 

become such a ubiquitous—if invisible—aspect of life that consumer demand will likely 

not begin to shrink significantly until the recession becomes especially prolonged. 

However, as unfavorable economic circumstances persist, the commercial space industry 

is likely to suffer the belated effects of the worldwide economic downturn.Many analysts 

predict that 2010 and 2011 may prove especially difficult years for the commercial space 

industry, with a significant flattening or contraction possible.

A downturn in the commercial space industry would have significant implications for 

spacepower.The existence of a commercial space industry outside of direct government 

spacepower efforts expands the range of spacepower options available to policymakers.If 

spacepower is ultimately about power projection—the ability to access and use space for 

strategic national needs and objectives and to deny adversaries that ability—then each of 

the four segments of the commercial space industry discussed in this chapter plays a key 

role in complementing the spacepower of the nation-state. 

As the world moves into the 21st century, the possibility of asymmetric national security 

threats posed by terrorists or rogue states remains central to defense policymaking. In the 

U.S. space community, this has translated into efforts to ensure both traditional and 

responsive space capabilities that can deploy space assets with global effects on short 

notice. The U.S. Government continues to fund the development of vehicles designed for 

short launch turnaround times and maximum flexibility. Parallel to these efforts, the 

military is increasing research and development funding for smallsats, which promise to 

carry out many of the functions of larger satellites at a fraction of the cost.The U.S. 

Government is also promoting new technologies and markets through cash prizes such as 

the Centennial Challenges competitions, as well as initiatives such as the COTS 

agreements.These government-funded efforts to create an operationally responsive, 

comprehensive space capability will have increasing commercial implications. If the U.S. 

Government eventually permits nonsensitive technologies from these more agile vehicles 
and smaller satellites to be used commercially, payload functionality may be increased 

and launch costs may be lowered to the point where both the satellite manufacturing and 

launch services markets can be reinvigorated. Heightened focus on national security 

threats and growing reliance on the availability of multiple data sources have also led to 

an increase in the demand for satellite communications by deployed U.S. personnel, with 

a focus on innovations such as communications-on-the-move. This increase has a 

generally positive effect on the satellite services and ground equipment sectors, which 

provide additional communications capability to the government.

For the more immediate present and future, the commercial sector is enabling new 

markets largely without government assistance. The successful capture of the Ansari X 

Prize by Scaled Composites' SpaceShipOne vehicle in October 2004 demonstrated that 

private incentives could entice entrepreneurs to develop their own launch systems and 

other space technologies independent of government assistance. The U.S. Government, 

though, is also promoting these new markets through the Centennial Challenges 

competitions and the Commercial Orbital Transportation Services agreements. At the 

same time, the SpaceShipOne vehicle itself brought the prospect of suborbital space 

tourism one step closer to reality. Virgin Galactic and other suborbital space tourism 

companies are currently expected to begin service by 2010. Since the cost of a suborbital 

space tourism flight is projected to be several orders of magnitude cheaper than that of an 

orbital flight—an expected $200,000 versus $20 million—the number of suborbital space 

tourism flights per year may be in the low hundreds within the next decade. This 

emerging market, when realized, will likely have a significant impact on the structure of 

the space industry as a whole.

Advances in space technology will have an impact on the commercial industry as well as 

the space community. An example of a significant technology issue is the active lifespan 

of satellites. The lifespan of an average satellite ranges roughly from 5 to 15 years 

depending on the application. Low and medium Earth orbit satellites tend to operate for 

shorter life spans than GEO satellites, which have planned design lives of about 15 years. 

Extending the average life of all satellites could impact the industry in a variety of ways. 

Longer-life satellites will reduce the need for replacements to maintain the same amount 

of capacity, which would be financially beneficial, but there are related limitations. For 

example, if a satellite is designed for 20 years of service but has a defect that renders the 

satellite useless in 10 years, operators and insurers would face significantly increased 

losses. If satellites worked perfectly for 20 years but a new technology development 

rendered them obsolete, there would be financial losses. Long-life satellites may in 

general have trouble adapting to changing market conditions and innovative 

technologies.Conversely, making satellites with shorter lifespans may give an operator 

the ability to adapt to changing economic, technological, and political forces.The shorter 

lifespan could allow for a greater quantity of industry activity using the most up-to-date 

technology, but would require more launches and more satellites to meet the capability of 

a longer life satellite on orbit, potentially increasing total costs.

Another issue that could have effects on the commercial space industry in the future is 

the threat of hostile attacks against its assets, which would be detrimental to the industry. 
The U.S. military has continued to increase its reliance on commercial space assets, 

particularly communications and remote sensing capabilities. This reliance leads to 

concerns about attacks on commercial assets that are being used, or are perceived to be 

used, for military purposes. Vulnerabilities exist in the space and ground segments as 

well as in the transmission and sensing of data—the entire commercial industry is 

vulnerable, though efforts have begun to strengthen commercial space defenses against 

attacks. Potential attacks could range from physical to electronic attacks that destroy, 

deny, or disable space capabilities. If commercial assets are targeted and rendered 

inoperable, their operators will incur financial losses. Satellite operators who avoid 

working with the military may still have their assets targeted, and the consequences of 

attacks on noncommercial assets—for example, orbital debris—could affect commercial 

assets. If commercial assets are targeted, the military may be more inclined to build their 

own hardened spacecraft rather than purchase services from industry, meaning there will 

be significant consequences for the overall commercial industry.

Space activity itself is not a major economic force, but it is a potent economic enabler 

and a critical component of any nation's infrastructure. For example, timing signals from 

the GPS constellation are utilized by banks and other financial institutions around the 

globe to keep financial systems synchronized. Satellite communications systems facilitate 

the global communications necessary for international banking and commerce. The news 

and entertainment industries are also dependent on satellite capabilities. Overall, the 

globalized economy relies heavily on satellite technology and infrastructure.

The implications of these current and future commercial space industry trends for 

spacepower theory are best understood as they pertain to space assets. In all four market 

sectors that define the industry, any U.S. advantages that exist are being reduced by 

competition from European and Asian organizations. In the satellite services and ground 

equipment segments, U.S. commercial firms have the most advanced technologies and a 

stable customer base. The potential customer base and content demand in the European 

and Asian markets, though, suggest that the services sector will continue to grow in these 

locations. Similarly, new Asian entrants to the satellite manufacturing and launch 

services markets—particularly China and India—signal that other nations will 

increasingly compete with the United States in space technology and hardware. 

Moreover, as American export restrictions increasingly encourage other nations to 

collaborate in order to achieve their space goals outside the framework created by the 

United States, it is reasonable to assume that the United States will continue to lose 

market share and related technological advantage. Given these realities, the ultimate 

solution for the United States to achieve its spacepower objectives may lie in some 

combination of U.S. military investments in cutting-edge technologies coordinated with 

incentives that more fully align the commercial space industry with strategic spacepower 

goals or a return to the public-private partnerships that established the industry.

The commercial industry is a critical part of national spacepower. It provides capabilities 

not only commercially as a major part of the global economy but also for government 

use. Market forces and the business environment often drive the industrial landscape, but 
incentives and impediments from the government also provide significant influence. As 

such, when a nation is developing its spacepower, it must realize that its policies can 

affect the commercial industry with positive and negative results regarding national 

interests and the future of the space industry.

Notes

1. Satellite Industry Association and Futron Corporation, State of the Satellite Industry Report, June 

2008, 10, available online at 

<www.futron.com/pdf/resource_center/reports/2008SSIR.pdf/PDF/2006SIAStateofSatelliteIndustr

yPres.pdf>.

2. Ibid., 10–12. 

3. Ibid., 13.

4. Ibid., 9.

5. Federal Aviation Administration Office of Commercial Space Transportation and the Commercial 

Space Transportation Advisory Committee, 2006 Commercial Space Transportation Forecasts, 

May 2008, available at 

<www.faa.gov/about/office_org/headquarters_offices/ast/media/2008%20Forecasts%20GSO%Co

mmercial

%20Space%Transportation%20May%202008%website.pdf>.

6. InfoCom and SagaTel, Global Telecommunications Markets and Forecasts for 2003–2007 

(Stuttgart: InfoCom GmbH), 38.

7. Satellite Industry Association and Futron Corporation, State of the Satellite Industry Report, June 

2008, available at <www.futron.com/pdf/resource _center/reports/2008SSIR.pdf>.

8. Ibid., 7–8.
Chapter 7:

Merchant and Guardian Challenges in the Exercise of Spacepower

Scott Pace

Over 20 years ago in a speech at Moscow State University, President Ronald Reagan 

noted the implications of space-based information technologies: "Linked by a network of 

satellites and fiber-optic cables, one individual with a desktop computer and a telephone 

commands resources unavailable to the largest governments just a few years ago. . . . 

Like a chrysalis, we're emerging from the economy of the Industrial Revolution."2 

The linkages between space, information technologies, and the global economy have 

accelerated and become even more profound with the widespread use of global 

positioning system (GPS) technologies and remote sensing imagery and the deeper 

integration of satellites with terrestrial communications networks. Traveling toward the 

Earth from deep space, one encounters whole fleets of satellites in geosynchronous and 

polar orbits that feed and transfer information to their commercial, military, and scientific 

users. Even a few educational and hobbyist payloads are in orbit or hosted on other 

spacecraft. 

Given the scope and diversity of these space systems, it is impossible to imagine the 

modern global economy—not to mention modern U.S. military forces—functioning 

without them. This dependency in turn has led to concerns about potential attacks against 

space systems. While media and academic debates focus on the prospect of weapons in 

space—in particular, the offensive application of force from space—in actuality, existing 

or even prospective military capabilities are nonexistent.3 Instead, the United States has 

focused on improving space situational awareness, defensive counterspace (that is, 

protecting friendly space capabilities from enemy attack or interference), and repairing 

military space programs that have encountered cost, schedule, and technical difficulties. 

Spacepower has been a difficult concept to define even with a half-century of global 

experience with space flight and operations. Although the topic has been raised in 

professional military circles for decades, space-based forces lack widely accepted 

military doctrine, which is not the case for land, sea, and air forces. Part of the challenge 

is that space systems do not directly represent "hard" or traditional military capabilities. 

Rather, space systems enable these capabilities. Space systems tend to represent or imply 

other capabilities that may have great political significance (for example, the Soviet 

demonstration of its intercontinental ballistic missile [ICBM] capabilities with the launch 

of Sputnik and the U.S. demonstration of precision strike using GPS in the first Gulf 

War). These capabilities take time to comprehend and understand. Even purely civilian 

space activities, such as the Apollo missions to the Moon or the creation of the 

International Space Station, can be forms of spacepower. They shape and influence 

international perceptions of the United States, even though they have no direct relation to 
U.S. military capabilities. Finally, the ability to design, develop, and deploy space 

systems is also a form of economic power. Not only can U.S. entities create the hardware 

and integrate the systems, they also have the business management skills needed to raise 

funding in open markets across international boundaries. 

The use of space today reflects the full range of national and international interests, and 

its use tomorrow likely will reflect those same interests. If humanity succeeds in 

expanding civilization beyond Earth, what will be the values and the national and 

international interests that shape the expansion? Spacepower is not the same as, and need 

not imply, space-based weapons (which do not exist). Nor can spacepower be considered 

a purely symbolic concept given the criticality of space to military and economic 

systems. As will be argued, spacepower will be shaped and defined by national security 

and commercial objectives, and more generally by the competing and cooperating 

interests of the public and private sectors. 

What is Spacepower? 

In an analogy to airpower and seapower, the term spacepower would seem to imply the 

employment of military forces operating in a distinct medium (the space environment) to 

achieve some national goal or military objective. A decade ago, U.S. Air Force doctrine 

defined spacepower as the "capability to exploit space forces to support national security 

strategy and achieve national security objectives."4 It also defined air and space power as 

"the synergistic application of air, space, and information systems to project global 

strategic military power." These definitions were criticized as incomplete, as they did not 

capture important realities of existing and potential military space activities.5 

First, there was the implied assumption that the identification of military space forces 

alone provides the necessary and sufficient conditions for understanding the strategic 

power of the Nation with respect to space. Yet the reality of modern space activity is that 

civil and commercial systems also play an important role in the Nation's space 

capabilities and affect their ability to achieve national security objectives. Partnerships 

between military, civil, and commercial communities are vital to the successful execution 

of national and military security strategies (for example, communications, environmental 

monitoring, and logistics). Thus, spacepower should be understood as more than military 

forces. As General Hap Arnold said of airpower: "Airpower is the total aviation 

activity—civilian and military, commercial and private, potential as well as existing."6 

The same thought can and should be applied to a complete definition of spacepower. 

Second, the definitions implied that spacepower was focused on "global" and "strategic" 

concerns alone. This is understandable, as national security space capabilities (including 

military and intelligence uses) have historically been thought of as enabling strategic 

functions for nuclear operations and national-level intelligence collection, for example. 

This is, however, an overly narrow view that became outmoded by the first Gulf War. 

Through the 1990s, space capabilities were becoming increasingly visible and vital to 

military operations. They assisted in the execution of hostile actions but also played a 

role in peacekeeping and humanitarian relief. Consequently, space forces were 
recognized as more than a tool for achieving strategic global objectives, as was the case 

during the Cold War. They became an integral part of how U.S. forces operated across 

the spectrum. 

Third, the definitions gave the impression of being taken at one point in time—that is, at 

the instant during which power is being projected in support of a national objective. 

Power can be thought of as the ability to not only employ forces but also to shape the 

battlespace before the initiation of conflict. As with other forms of national power, both 

absolute and relative capabilities are important: what are my forces capable of doing, and 

how do they compare with those of potential adversaries? Since space-power is more 

than military forces alone, it should be understood as something that can evolve. The 

ability to shape the actions of others may be as significant as what can be accomplished 

unilaterally.7 

As with any evolving military field, one can expect intense debates over doctrine. Like 

the emergence of airpower and seapower, spacepower is both similar to and different than 

other forms of military and national power. As the following examples illustrate,

spacepower has many different facets depending on one's perspective and objectives. 

From the viewpoint of the tactical commander, spacepower represents capabilities that 

can help put "bombs on target." To the regional commander, spacepower represents 

capabilities that shape the entire battlespace, including the provision of logistical support 

and the use of joint and combined arms. The regional commander's view is broader than 

the lower level commander's view.8 From the viewpoint of the President and Congress, 

the battlespace is only one of several areas of concern. Domestic political support, 

relations with allies and coalition partners, and economic conditions also must be 

considered. Spacepower, therefore, is connected to other forms of national power, 

including economic strength, scientific capabilities, and international leadership. National 

leaders may use military spacepower to achieve nonmilitary objectives or exploit 

nonmilitary capabilities to enhance military spacepower. 

An assessment of spacepower should include all of the Nation's space capabilities, at all 

levels and timeframes, even in peacetime before conflict begins. In this regard, 

spacepower would be more properly defined as the pursuit of national objectives through 

the medium of space and the use of space capabilities.

9 Although broad and general, this 

definition focuses on national objectives, the use of space as a medium distinct from land, 

air, or sea, and the use of space-based capabilities. The effective exercise of space-power 

may require, but is not limited to, the use of military forces. 

More recent Air Force definitions of spacepower have become more inclusive: 

Space power. a. The capability to exploit space forces to support national 

security strategy and achieve national security objectives (Air Force 

Doctrine Document [AFDD] 1). b. The capability to exploit civil, 

commercial, intelligence, and national security space systems and 

associated infrastructure to support national security strategy and national 

objectives from peacetime through combat operations (AFDD 1–2). c. The 
total strength of a nation's capabilities to conduct and influence activities, 

to, in, through, and from space to achieve its objectives.10 

The first definition is a traditional, military-focused one, while the second includes use of 

nonmilitary capabilities to achieve national security objectives. The third definition refers 

to the total strength of the Nation. However, there are no definitions that refer to using 

nonmilitary capabilities to shape the environment before conflicts occur or using military 

capabilities to advance nonmilitary national objectives. This chapter focuses on the nature 

and uses of spacepower at strategic and policy levels in both military and nonmilitary 

applications. 

Schools of Thought in Space Advocacy 

Pioneering space advocates, such as Wernher von Braun, readily adopted the idea that 

government can and should fund space work. In a series of articles for Collier's magazine 

in the 1950s, von Braun sketched out his vision for space development. First came 

orbiting satellites, followed by manned reusable vehicles, then a space station, bases on 

the Moon, and finally an expedition to Mars. The color drawings were vivid and realistic, 

and the magazine was inundated with inquiries on how one could become an astronaut. 

The "von Braun paradigm" of space development—represented by the step-by-step 

creation of reusable shuttles, space stations, lunar bases, and Mars expeditions—seemed 

so logical and direct that it continues to hold sway years later.11 Over the past few 

decades, reports recommending future space activities have repeatedly endorsed these 

same basic elements, building progressively more complex capabilities on the basis of 

government-funded research. 

Disappointment with the ending of the first lunar explorations and reduction in National 

Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) spending in the 1970s led space 

advocates to form educational and advocacy organizations, including the National Space 

Institute and the L5 Society. The latter was particularly interesting in that it did not 

advocate a variation of the von Braun paradigm but rather envisioned creating large 

settlements in free space, mining the Moon and asteroids for resources, and constructing 

solar-power satellites to beam energy back to Earth. In reaction in part to the "Limits to 

Growth" arguments, which predicted a looming disaster due to overpopulation, 

accelerated industrialization, malnutrition, dwindling resources, and a deteriorating 

environment, these advocates saw space as a means to adventure and a solution to 

environmental and natural resource problems on Earth.12 American space advocates 

typically shared the view that human expansion into space was both desirable and 

inevitable. This new form of manifest destiny was consistent with U.S. history. The 

frontier always has been viewed as a utopian wilderness, ripe for satisfying various 

philosophical and emotional needs, while at the same time being subject to extensive 

military and economic government interventions to meet those needs.13 Examples of 

government interventions on the frontier include land grants, support for education and 

transcontinental railways, and the use of the Army to protect settlers and traders.14 In 

contrast to the westward expansion across North America between 1800 and 1890, 

however, much more substantial technical, economic, and political constraints exist that 
hinder space development. These constraints quite literally create higher barriers to entry. 

This has prompted some advocates to support greater government spending, while others 

have looked to private enterprise to "open the frontier." 

In the 1980s, President Ronald Reagan called for a Strategic Defense Initiative to use 

space weapons to defend the Nation from ballistic missile attacks. Multiple groups 

formed educational organizations, such as High Frontier, to support space development 

as part of a stronger national defense. In a variation on the von Braun paradigm, 

advocates supported the creation of massive launch systems and a space infrastructure to 

support a global defense network. With this infrastructure in place, other space activities, 

such as mining the Moon or sending probes farther into the solar system, would become 

easier and more affordable. 

A common thread running through the various "post-Apollo" visions was the need for a 

revolutionary effort, like Apollo, to meet some overarching goal. In some cases, the 

motivation was to solve an energy crisis; in others, it was to defeat a military threat. The 

L5 Society thought that space could be colonized by a large number of people who could 

create whole new societies and earn their way through exports of energy back to Earth. 

But even they saw the need for government involvement and leadership to start the 

process. While the details may vary, the fundamental rationale for a national-level space 

effort has remained unchanged. The Nation pursues space as a way to secure scientific 

knowledge, security, international cooperation, and other benefits to humanity. 

Meanwhile, new commercial space capabilities grew independently of the government, 

and now commercial investment exceeds government spending (civil and military) on 

space.15 Rather than a government-driven, revolutionary development, the growth of 

space commerce has been largely a market-driven, evolutionary one. Given the cost of 

access to space, it is not surprising that the primary "cargo" now being transported 

between Earth and space is massless photons carrying bits of data. But these bits are part 

of a larger global information infrastructure that has created a new "skin" for the planet. 

Some of this skin is buried under the sea and underground in cables; some of it is 

composed of microwave relays and cellular phone networks; and some of it is in orbit, 

consisting of communications, GPS, and remote sensing satellites. Some of these 

satellites are purely commercial, while others are government-owned but used by private 

companies for commercial applications. The term dual-use in space systems, therefore, 

encompasses both "civil-military" and "public-private" applications. 

The growth of commercial space capabilities calls attention to the interplay between 

public and private interests in dual-use space technologies, which include launch 

services, communications, navigation, and remote sensing. These technologies have great 

potential to shape which national capabilities actually occur and whether American 

interests are advanced or harmed as they are adopted in global markets. In contrast to 

when the von Braun paradigm was created, the size and scope of commercial space 

activity are immense. Events such as SpaceShipOne's 2004 suborbital flight and Bigelow 

Aerospace's 2006 demonstration of an inflatable structure in space, and private financing 

of new launch vehicles, such as SpaceX's Falcon, indicate the increasing sophistication of 
space entrepreneurs. The combination of well-established industries and dynamic new 

entrants is creating opportunities for governments as well. The Defense Department 

hopes to use the Falcon launch vehicle for small payloads, and NASA hopes to buy 

commercial launch services to support the International Space Station after the 

administration retires the space shuttle in 2010. Public interest in space tourism was not 

created by government policy; private citizens have expressed a desire to travel to space 

and have spent millions of dollars of their own money for the privilege. This interest 

could some day evolve into a viable market that will attract entrepreneurs, who in turn 

may create capabilities that governments can use without having to pay for their 

development. 

Single government projects by themselves may be vital, but they are not always 

interesting or indicative of future challenges. Many commercial activities rely on 

government policies and actions, but they are independent of government command or 

direct control. Markets, funding, and even technologies are almost completely 

international. Government spending, while still dominant in many space markets, is not 

as important or even as attractive as it once was. As a consequence, it is insufficient to 

focus only on government space programs and budgets. Space analysts and policymakers 

need to address the more subtle relations between government actions and private 

markets. New schools of thought are needed that recognize a greater role for the private 

sector in creating and sustaining capabilities relevant to the Nation's spacepower. 

Two Cultures: Merchants and Guardians 

The scope and size of public-private interactions in space have implications for space 

doctrine, advocacy, and policy. Some of these interactions arise from debates over the 

choice of mechanisms, markets, or governments for accomplishing some objective.16 For 

example, to what extent should the government rely on commercial space services, such 

as communications satellites or expendable launch vehicles? To what extent should the 

government provide space-based navigation and environmental monitoring services, 

which have commercial applications? Other interactions concern the competitiveness of 

commercial capabilities and how their viability affects choices by foreign governments. 

For example, can the proliferation of ballistic missile technologies be discouraged by the 

availability of low-cost launch services? What restrictions should be applied to private 

remote sensing activities if a country objects to having its territory imaged? Finally, some 

interactions affect common needs, such as international security, global trade, and even 

the radio spectrum. Does the widespread availability of Earth remote sensing data 

enhance regional stability? What restrictions, if any, should apply to sales of launch 

services from nonmarket economies? How should the use of the radio spectrum by public 

safety and national security organizations be protected from commercial interests and 

vice versa? 

Public policy choices, whether those of the U.S. Government, foreign governments, or 

the international community in general, are subject to many distinct influences. Perhaps 

the most pervasive influences, however, are the underlying assumptions the public and 

private sectors bring to these choices. These assumptions constitute what has been termed 
as two cultures, those of the Guardians and those of the Merchants.

17 The term Guardians 

comes from Plato's The Republic. It includes members of the political class who are 

responsible for governing and teaching. In space policy, one finds many examples of 

Guardians, good and bad, among career civil servants, military officers, political 

appointees, congressional staff, journalists, academics, and even the occasional corporate 

officer and professional politician. The term Merchants refers to the group of people 

whose culture encourages energy and risk-taking. Although examples are mostly found in 

business and to a lesser extent in international science, they sometimes are represented in 

government, the military, and academia. 

Merchant behavior is found in peaceful competition; contracts and the ability to work 

with strangers are accepted as normal parts of commerce. People divided by language, 

ethnicity, and distance will come together in a marketplace, if nowhere else, to trade. 

Relationships need not be permanent, outside of family, but rather flexible and transitory 

as necessary to make mutually beneficial deals. This flexibility creates opportunities for 

social movement, the absorption of immigrants, and invention. The motto "city air is free 

air" arose in the Middle Ages. It recognized a society free from the restrictions imposed 

by nobility and the church. 

The role of Guardians is to protect some larger goal or system, such as society, the 

government, or a political philosophy. As a consequence of their public functions, 

Guardians are expected to be loyal, obedient, and disciplined. To avoid corruption and 

treason, they are enjoined from engaging in trade. To ensure that political decisions are 

carried out, they must respect hierarchy and the decisions made by recognized authorities. 

These are not necessarily modern or Western concepts. The samurai of feudal Japan were 

forbidden to engage in trade, just as tradesmen were forbidden to own weapons. One of 

the main features of a functioning government is an effective monopoly on the exercise 

of force. This monopoly enables Guardians to carry out other state functions. They can 

impose and collect taxes, establish rules and regulations, and negotiate agreements with 

other states. 

The roles of Guardians and Merchants are in tension, but intimately linked. For the 

"invisible hand" of Adam Smith's market economy to function, a predictable, supportive 

environment must exist to create wealth. The creation and maintenance of such an 

environment requires the use of government power as the hidden (or sometimes overt) 

fist to enable the rule of law. Ideally, the need for actual force is minimized when the 

consent of the governed is secured via a democratic process. Whether by diplomats or 

soldiers, it is government power that establishes justice and provides for the common 

defense. Even the staunchest advocates of limited government recognize the need for 

preventing cases of force (by protecting against criminal violence or military aggression) 

and fraud (through enforcement of contracts). Thus, the key characteristics of the West—

democracy, a liberal, pluralistic civil society, and capitalism—are shaped by the 

competition and cooperation of Merchant and Guardian cultures. 

While both Guardians and Merchants may be necessary to society, they can create serious 

problems when they either fail to do their duty or seek to take on the role of the other. In 
space policy, these problems arise when the government conducts space transportation 

and communications or other commercial-like activities. Similarly, conflicts occur when 

the government does not carry out its duties and inhibits industry. Failing to uphold 

regulations or respond to complaints of unfair competition from foreign governments is a 

good example. Conversely, Merchants should not be made responsible for Guardian 

functions. For space activities, these can mean the enforcement of export controls, the 

negotiation of international spectrum allocations, or even the conduct of crucial military 

functions (for example, missile warnings). This is not to say Merchants cannot be 

patriotic or reliable, but their functions require the public service traits of a Guardian 

culture. 

It has been said that the environments of business and government are alike in all the 

unimportant ways. Civil servants and businesspeople may use the same telephones and 

office software, occupy similar offices and parking spaces, read the same newspapers, 

and even attend the same churches. But their daily work and worldviews are likely alien 

to each other. Businesspeople in foreign countries are likely to speak a common cultural 

language, just as civil servants and soldiers find common touchstones with their foreign 

counterparts. Conversations across these separate cultures can avoid mutual 

incomprehension if they first recognize that they possess distinct worldviews and 

personalities. 

"Merchants and Guardians" in the 21st Century 

In the 10 years since the original presentation of the "Merchants and Guardians" paper,18 

several dramatic events have occurred, notably the 2001 attacks on New York and 

Washington and the global war on terrorism, the 2003 loss of the space shuttle Columbia, 

and President Bush's 2004 speech on the "Vision for Space Exploration." Over the same 

period, conditions in the commercial space industry have evolved greatly. Space-based 

information systems have continued to grow, with direct TV, direct audio broadcasting, 

and ancillary terrestrial components to mobile satellite services (MSS) filling in for the 

collapse of overly optimistic MSS expectations. After emerging from bankruptcy, Iridium 

and Globalstar are today serving customers worldwide. A new generation of better 

financed entrepreneurs is developing suborbital and orbital launch vehicles and Soyuzbased tourist flights to the International Space Station. The provision of these services has 

become a familiar, if not routine, occurrence. The prospects of space tourism are being 

taken more seriously, and as a result, commercial space ventures are starting to progress 

beyond the movement of photons (information) and into the movement of actual mass, 

including people.

The most significant event for the civil space sector was the loss on reentry of Columbia 

on February 1, 2003. As in the case of the Challenger accident, the tragic loss of the crew 

and one-fourth of the Nation's shuttle fleet led to a deep reexamination of why the United 

States was risking human lives in space. In the aftermath of Challenger, President 

Reagan directed NASA to use the space shuttle only to launch those satellites that could 

not use commercial launch services. Human lives would not be risked to perform tasks 

that could be done just as effectively by unmanned rockets. This action also eliminated 
the shuttle as a source of government competition to commercial suppliers and helped to 

jump-start a viable commercial launch industry. 

In the aftermath of the tragedy, the Columbia Accident Investigation Board (CAIB) 

criticized NASA not only for the technical failures leading to the accident, but also for a 

lack of national focus and rationale for risking human life. In its report, the CAIB 

observed that there had been a "lack, over the past three decades, of any national mandate 

providing NASA a compelling mission requiring human presence in space."19 So while 

the Challenger accident resulted in a decision forbidding the risking of human life for 

certain purposes, the Columbia accident raised the question: for what purposes was 

human life worth risking? These questions sparked internal White House discussions 

during the fall of 2003, which were expanded to include NASA and other agencies.20 The 

answer was provided in President Bush's January 14, 2004, announcement at NASA 

headquarters of a new "Vision for Space Exploration." With the completion of the 

International Space Station, the shuttle program would end in 2010, and a new generation 

of spacecraft would conduct a "sustained and affordable human and robotic program to 

explore the solar system and beyond."21 If human lives were to be placed at risk, the 

potential gain would be commensurate and require explorations beyond low Earth orbit. 

Congress later endorsed the objectives of the President's speech in the passage of the 

2005 NASA Authorization. After a prolonged start-up phase in 2004, as NASA 

considered a range of technologies and options to fulfill the direction of the President and 

Congress, work accelerated with the arrival of Michael Griffin as the new NASA 

administrator in April 2005. He summarized the proposition of the "Vision for Space 

Exploration" in a speech before the National Space Club on February 9, 2006: 

We assume risk in human spaceflight because leadership in this endeavor 

is a strategic imperative for the United States. . . . Our Nation needed to 

decide whether the goals and benefits of human spaceflight were 

commensurate with the costs and risks of this enterprise, and that for this 

to be true, those goals must lie beyond the simple goals achievable in lowEarth orbit. . . . The Agency is directed to "establish a program to develop 

a sustained human presence on the Moon, including a robust precursor 

program, to promote exploration, science, commerce, and United States 

preeminence in space, and as a stepping stone to future exploration of 

Mars and other destinations". . . . We will do these things in concert with 

other nations having similar interests and values. And, as we look forward 

to the events that will define this century and beyond, I have no doubt that 

the expansion of human presence into the solar system will be among the 

greatest of our achievements.22 

During 2005, NASA defined its architecture for returning humans to the Moon. The 

agency designed a new generation of launch vehicles for taking humans and cargo to 

space, including a heavy-lift cargo launcher that would play a vital role in sending 

humans to Mars. In contrast to the von Braun paradigm, NASA's exploration plans build 

new capabilities gradually and incrementally to adapt to changing budget priorities. In 
essence, it is a "go-as-you-pay" philosophy. These plans also make more intentional use 

of commercial capabilities. The largest single example is the $500-million Commercial 

Orbital Transportation Services (COTS) program to help develop commercial sources of 

crew and cargo services for the International Space Station. In August 2006, NASA 

selected SpaceX and Rocketplane Kistler to develop and demonstrate their vehicles with 

partial NASA support. Under the Space Act Agreements, the work will be performed 

before a competitive award of service contracts. If successful, commercial suppliers 

could help support the International Space Station after NASA completes the shuttle 

assembly missions. They also could provide alternatives to the use of foreign launch 

systems. This would in turn free up the shuttle's planned follow-on systems, including the 

Crew Launch Vehicle (Aries) and Crew Exploration Vehicles (Orion), to support lunar 

operations. 

The "Vision for Space Exploration" is an example of the use of space-power to achieve 

national objectives. While the NASA effort is exclusively civil, the capabilities created 

have the potential to advance U.S. economic, foreign policy, and national security 

objectives. The process of creating new technologies and systems to operate routinely on 

the Moon will enable the Nation to venture farther into the solar system—exploring, 

using local resources, learning new skills, and making new discoveries. In the broadest 

sense, the "Vision for Space Exploration" is not about repeating Apollo. In the words of 

the President's science advisor, John Marburger, it seeks to "incorporate the Solar System 

in our economic sphere."23 Thus, the civil space strategy chosen by the United States can 

be seen as an effort to advance national interests of a Guardian culture, while using the 

narrower interests of a Merchant culture. Commercial capabilities strengthen the Nation's 

space abilities; they also deepen the Nation's interest in securing and protecting any 

resulting economic benefits. 

U.S. national space policy has routinely recognized three distinct sectors of space 

activity: national security (military, intelligence), commercial, and civil (including both 

scientific research and services, such as weather forecasting).24 The functions performed 

by each can be organized along a spectrum, depending on whether they are driven by 

governments or markets. Satellite communications occupy one end of the spectrum and 

are largely driven by commercial interests, such as numbers of customers, revenue, and 

the deployment of new technologies. At the other end are force applications that include 

space-based weapons and ballistic missile defense systems. Although they may use 

commercially derived technologies, they are driven by political-military requirements. In 

the middle are civil government functions that involve public safety. These include 

weather monitoring and navigation. These positions are not static; they can change over 

time. For example, GPS was developed to meet military requirements, but civil and 

commercial entities developed many useful applications of the technology. Space launch 

capabilities are considered to underlie all space activities and are thus a primary concern 

for all sectors. 

Government and commercial interests in space technologies, systems, and services can 

intersect. They can be categorized in three segments. First, there are those that only the 

government would require due to their associated high costs or specialized nature. 
Examples include space-qualified fission-power reactors and space-based observatories. 

Interactions are at government direction, mainly through contracts and grants. Second, 

there are segments dominated by the private sector due to the size of global markets and 

diffusion of underlying technologies. Examples of this segment include information 

technologies and biotechnologies. Governments are important for a variety of purposes 

but do not exercise control. Interactions can be more commercial-like, particularly where 

the government is another customer or partner. Third, there are gray areas, namely launch 

services, navigation, and remote sensing. The government is crucial, but not dominant. In 

these cases, the government may play the role of the research and development patron, 

anchor customer, service provider, and regulator. It is in these gray areas where the 

Merchant and Guardian cultures are more likely to clash because of evolving and 

changing roles. Such clashes can be expected to continue as human activity expands 

beyond low Earth orbit. 

In its major outlines, U.S. space policy has remained remarkably stable since the end of 

the Cold War. The 2006 National Space Policy of the Bush administration can be seen as 

a continuation of the 1996 National Space Policy of the Bill Clinton administration, 

which in turn continued many of the themes of the 1989 National Space Policy of the 

George H.W. Bush administration. Much of the media commentary after the release of 

the 2006 policy focused not so much on substance as on presentation and tonal 

differences, particularly with respect to U.S. national security interests. Foreign 

governments expressed concern with the new policy, which prompted State Department 

Under Secretary Robert Joseph to state: 

At its most basic level, U.S. space policy has not changed significantly 

from the beginning of our ventures into space. Consistent with past 

policies, the United States does not monopolize space; we do not deny 

access to space for peaceful purposes by other nations. Rather, we explore 

and use space for the benefit of the entire world. This remains a central 

principle of our policy. What the new policy reflects, however, are 

increased actions to ensure the long-term security of our space assets in 

light of new threats and as a result of our increased use of space.25 

In addition to stressing increased U.S. reliance on space assets and clarifying what the 

new policy did not mean, Joseph tried to bring attention to items that were novel: "The 

new policy also gives prominence to several goals only touched upon in previous policy 

documents, including: strengthening the space science and technology base, developing 

space professionals, and strengthening U.S. industrial competitiveness, especially through 

use of U.S. commercial space capabilities." 

Not surprisingly, these are areas of great common interest for the public and private 

sectors and areas of friction between the Merchant and Guardian cultures. In addition, the 

2006 policy included the need to assure "reliable access to and use of radio frequency 

spectrum and orbital assignments," which is a logical corollary to ensuring access to the 

space assets themselves. One cannot run wires to satellites; therefore, spectrum access 

and protection are of crucial importance, perhaps second only to the launch itself. 
A comparison of the 1999 discussion of "Merchant and Guardian" policy conflicts with 

those seen today reveals many recurring issues. Spectrum management and the burden of 

export controls remain important, while concerns about competition from nonmarket 

economies seem to have abated—perhaps as a side effect of continuing export control 

limitations. However, there is increased interest in space tourism and related regulations, 

particularly with the 2004 flight of SpaceShipOne and the 2006 coverage of space tourist 

Anousheh Ansari. The prospect of commercial involvement in lunar operations, in 

addition to commercial supply of the International Space Station, has led to renewed 

discussions of private property rights on the Moon and other celestial bodies (to be 

discussed below). 

In recent years, the national security space sector has not experienced developments as 

outwardly dramatic as those occurring in the commercial and civil space sectors, which 

have included everything from major accidents and Presidential initiatives to mass media 

interest. However, the implications of these developments to national security space are 

just as important, if not more so, for the Nation's spacepower. The past decade has seen a 

growing concern with the ability of the Defense Department to develop and deploy space 

systems on time and on budget. Difficulties with major missile warning, communications, 

and imagery programs, just to name a few, have been widely reported in the press, 

although specific details are usually highly classified. Even relatively mature programs, 

such as GPS, have faced difficulties keeping to modernization schedules due to changing 

requirements, contractor difficulties, and gaps in system engineering expertise. So severe 

are these difficulties that the U.S. Air Force is reportedly considering "hiring outside 

engineers or consultants to oversee systems integration of its next-generation navigational 

satellites."26 

In fact, most of the new initiatives in the 2006 National Space Policy address four areas 

now considered to be serious problems for the U.S. Government: developing a highquality cadre of space professionals, improving development and procurement systems 

for space systems, enhancing interagency cooperation, and strengthening the space 

science, technology, and industrial base.27 Thus, while international media coverage 

painted the United States as taking a more aggressive military posture in space, the 

substance of the policy reflected problems in military acquisition programs that in turn 

stem from deficiencies in government management and contractor capabilities. It is not 

so much a question of which military capabilities the United States wants to deploy in 

space, but rather which capabilities it can employ, and whether they are commensurate 

with the threats and critical dependencies faced by the United States. Rather than the 

deployment of space-based weapons, as was contemplated during the Cold War, the 

immediate concerns of the military space sector are more basic. Can the military deliver 

space-derived services to deployed forces? Can it improve space situational awareness? 

And can the military get acquisition programs under control? 

The organizational challenges for U.S. military spacepower are formidable and too 

extensive to be treated in this chapter. However, as with all other parts of the national 

security community, the attacks of September 11 and the conflicts in Afghanistan and 
Iraq have affected U.S. spacepower in three important areas: capabilities, objectives, and 

relations with allies and partners. 

First, space capabilities have been and will continue to be crucial to almost all types of 

military operations, in all regions, and at all levels of conflict. That said, fiscal and 

technological limitations make it impossible to create space capabilities ideally suited to 

all conflicts in all regions, and choices must be made in what to buy and field. This in 

turn requires choosing among different U.S. military strategy objectives and the 

consequent force infrastructure to implement that strategy. Prosecuting a conventional 

conflict against one or more states, up to and including a peer competitor,28 is very 

different than fighting nonstate actors, rebuilding failed states, and carrying out 

operations other than war. Uncertainties over strategy objectives create tensions between 

funding development and operations, between competing technologies, and between 

which armed services, contractors, and parts of the industrial base should receive 

resources and attention. It would be easier if the United States could afford two different 

but interoperable force structures. However, it cannot, and space systems are caught in 

the debate over objectives. 

Second, unrelated to the September 11 attacks, the U.S. defense industrial base has 

experienced a dramatic consolidation since the end of the Cold War. On one hand, U.S. 

defense spending is very large—by some estimates almost half of global total spending.29 

On the other, like all U.S. industries, defense and space firms have been affected by 

globalization. New international competitors, increased competition for talent, and 

concern over market access have become issues. The size and sophistication of U.S. 

military capabilities, in particular the use of space systems, has made it difficult for all 

but a few countries (such as the United Kingdom, Australia, and North Atlantic Treaty 

Organization members) to operate easily with U.S. forces. The problems of the U.S. 

space industrial base cannot be solved by going outside the United States, even if the 

country wanted to. Comparable sources for the capabilities that the United States needs 

simply do not exist. 

Third, given the divergent but overlapping interests of Merchant and Guardian cultures 

engaged in space activity, uncertainty over national security objectives, and challenges to 

the creation of military space capabilities, it is increasingly important that the United 

States find partners to help shape the global environment before conflict occurs. Potential 

partners include public and private actors, international civil agencies, and foreign 

militaries. Shaping the environment means creating mutually beneficial relationships to 

reduce unintentional as well as intentional threats to crucial space dependencies. 

Examples include international protection of the space spectrum from interference, 

effective international enforcement of missile proliferation controls, promotion of 

common protocols to enhance interoperability of space-based communications, remote 

sensing and navigation services, and rules for international trade in space-related goods 

and services. While these steps may benefit foreign countries and companies, they would 

be even more beneficial to the United States given the country's reliance on space for 

economic stability and security. 
One of the newer and perhaps more difficult areas of conflict between Merchants and 

Guardians will be that of protecting commercial space infrastructure. As the U.S. military 

and economy rely more heavily on space, it is natural to worry about potential threats to 

the infrastructure, just as one might worry about critical ground-based infrastructure. Yet 

what can or should be done to protect those assets? Should they be hardened or made 

redundant? Should they carry sensors to warn of attack? Should the protected entity pay 

for the protection, or should the U.S. Government provide the enhanced security as a 

public good and cover the costs with tax money? What about internationally financed 

space infrastructure, which is practically everything commercial in orbit? It is easy to 

imagine the commercial sector resisting what it would perceive as new regulatory 

burdens or an "unfunded mandate." Likewise, it is easy to imagine the Defense 

Department's reluctance to absorb new costs when existing programs face difficulties. 

Yet the result for failing to protect these assets may be increased vulnerability of the 

United States and a threat to its ability to exercise spacepower. 

To summarize, events over the past several years have accelerated and intensified trends 

observed in the 1990s. They have shaped public and private sector interactions in space. 

As a result, leading challenges to the Merchant and Guardian relationship now include: 

• globalization and the characteristics of a "Flat World." This means that 

technology, capital, and talent move ever more freely and can create competitors 

to government programs.30 This is true even in the space world, with American 

tourists flying on Russian rockets, with small satellites being built from Surrey to 

Bangalore, and with European-Chinese collaborations to build constellations of 

navigation-satellite systems. 

• increased government dependence on commercial space capabilities. This has 

created new concerns, in addition to traditional government resistance to the loss 

of control over independent commercial space markets. 

• a recognizable loss of government "intellectual property" necessary to develop, 

oversee, and manage complex space systems. NASA is somewhat better 

positioned than the Air Force due to the talent of its field-center personnel. But 

NASA's workforce is getting older, and the agency has limited ability to hire. For 

Apollo, NASA was able to import skilled systems engineers from the Air Force's 

ICBM programs. That, however, is not an option today. NASA is trying to rebuild 

its internal systems engineering skills, and the Defense Department is proposing 

to create a new cadre of technical "space professionals." 

• a competitive environment and limited resources. Today, execution is the 

paramount policy issue. So to whom does spacepower flow? More than likely, it 

will be to those who can deliver capabilities necessary to meet threats or exploit 

opportunities— whether they are military, economic, scientific, or political. 

The Guardians within the U.S. space community are facing great difficulties, but the 

Merchants also are vulnerable. Weakness in security can be destabilizing because it 

invites opportunistic attacks and changes the deterrence calculations of adversaries. 

Weakness in commerce can cause commercial losses as well as longer term damage, 

especially if weak Guardians allow market distortions to persist because they fail to 
enforce international trade rules, spectrum regulations, intellectual property protections, 

and even export controls. In short, globalization is creating greater interdependency 

between the public and private sectors, not less. 

Space Exploration and Spacepower 

In spite of uncertainties and challenges in the national security sector, the Nation's 

interest in pursuing military spacepower is unquestioned. Similarly, the demands of a 

competitive global economy underscore the national interest in maintaining space-based 

information systems—most of which are dual use in nature (such as GPS, remote 

sensing, and communications). Separate from the military and commercial needs are the 

scientific ones. Although science and exploration are not required to ensure spacepower, 

the pursuit of knowledge can be seen as a discretionary activity that great nations 

undertake to help define their society, enhance their international prestige, and create new 

technologies to benefit people worldwide. What, then, is the enduring role of science and 

exploration in the spacepower of the Nation? 

The Cold War and competition with the Soviet Union for technological preeminence 

drove the Apollo, Gemini, and Mercury programs. Despite the desires of space advocates 

for the robust industrialization and settlement of space, the United States had not made 

their aspirations a compelling national interest. Even though the military and commercial 

sectors benefit enormously from space, it is not impossible to imagine a nation retreating 

from human spaceflight once it achieved the capability. That was not the case for the 

former Soviet Union. Even during the most extreme economic turmoil following the fall 

of communism, Russia did not abandon human spaceflight. In fact, it strived to maintain 

its program through every possible means. The U.S. "Vision for Space Exploration" is 

neither Apollo redux nor a commercial venture, and debates among space advocates 

continue over its purpose and meaning. It is therefore instructive to understand differing 

perceptions of the rationale for U.S. space exploration plans. 

Only tiny minorities of those engaged in space-related policy debates oppose 

government-funded space activities. Those who do are more concerned with particular 

uses and technologies, namely nuclear power, space-based weapons, and ballistic missile 

defenses. In fact, apathy and taking space capabilities for granted are arguably greater 

problems than direct opposition. At the risk of oversimplification, if not caricature, at 

least five different schools of thought have evolved from discussions about the priorities 

of human exploration of the Moon, Mars, and beyond, and how the Nation should carry 

out the program. 

Baseline 

The first school is that NASA itself is simply responding to the 2004 direction of 

President Bush and the 2005 NASA Authorization Act. The United States is fulfilling its 

commitments to its partners under the International Space Station agreements, ending the 

space shuttle program in 2010 once NASA completes assembling the space station, 

building a new generation of launch vehicles to ferry crew and cargo to space after the 
shuttle retires, establishing an outpost on the Moon, and laying the foundations for human 

expeditions to Mars—all while maintaining a diverse program of scientific research. 

Given limited budgets, the program is a "go-as-you-pay" effort, and programmatic 

priorities follow the policy priorities defined by the President and Congress. Given those 

same limited resources, NASA is open to international cooperation and commercial 

partnerships in all areas—with the exception of core launch and 

communications/navigation capabilities that are so strategic as to require avoiding foreign 

dependency. 

Technology First 

The second school argues that the United States does not have the technology to return to 

the Moon and travel to Mars, at least in a way that will be sustainable and affordable. 

Thus, the Nation should make the funding and development of new technologies the first 

priority and not commit to a specific architecture until several years from now. Arguably, 

NASA tried this approach for about a year after President Bush's speech, generating 

many interesting ideas and concepts. But the lack of tangible momentum was 

unsatisfactory to the White House and Congress. Upon confirmation in 2005, the new 

NASA administrator initiated a 90-day Exploration Systems Architecture Study precisely 

to help define a specific architecture for implementing human missions to the Moon. 

Funds were shifted from technology development to pay for new launch vehicles that 

were based on shuttle components and workforce skills. 

Science First 

This school argues that supporting peer-reviewed science should be the highest priority of 

NASA and that by implication, exploration efforts are little more than governmentfunded "tourism." Peer review is seen as providing the most objective assurance of 

quality; consequently, civil space activities not subject to peer review are seen, almost by 

definition, as less worthy. More practically, supporters of this school will say they are not 

intrinsically opposed to exploration because it may generate new opportunities for 

scientific research. However, they do not believe that funds should be shifted from 

science missions to pay for exploration. To fund the development of a new launch vehicle 

while maintaining the shuttle and space station programs, however, NASA chose to slow 

the rate of growth of science spending to 1 percent over the next several years. In 

previous budgets, the science community had planned for increases of up to 5 percent for 

a few years and then 2.4 percent per year as NASA's top line grew with inflation. This 

slower rate of growth required deferring several planned missions to keep international 

partner commitments on the space station. The resulting unhappiness with this decision 

was understandable, but it also reflected a fundamental difference in policy priorities for 

government funding. 

Commercial First 

This school is an example of Merchant culture. It argues that the government is so 

incapable of or grossly inefficient in the creation of space capabilities, especially 
compared with the private sector, that it should take an entirely different approach to 

human spaceflight. Instead of development contracts with government oversight, NASA 

should offer contracts for services, prizes, and other "pay-on-delivery" mechanisms to 

excite entrepreneurs. The rationale is that this will attract more private capital, create 

more diverse solutions, and offer a better chance of success than a government "all-eggsin-one-basket" approach. NASA is seeking to test this argument in part through the 

COTS program but is hedging its bets (post-shuttle) by having multiple backups for space 

station supply (use of the Crew Launch Vehicle, Russian launchers). Advocates of this 

school have argued that the very act of having backups shows NASA is insufficiently 

committed to commercial sources and therefore is deterring investments that would 

otherwise occur. Given the policy priorities of the President and Congress, however, it is 

hard to see how NASA could do otherwise than to hedge its bets. Again, this school 

reflects a fundamental difference in policy objectives for exploration—in this case, the 

highest good is growing commercial capabilities rather than doing science. 

Regional Interests 

The fifth school is a form of the old adage, "All politics is local." The primary concern 

lies with where the government spends its money. States with NASA field centers and 

major contracts can be expected to support programs that build on existing capabilities. 

This is not necessarily a bad thing, as minimizing new developments can help control 

costs. On the other hand, it can cause political resistance, especially if NASA tries to 

move work from one center to take advantage of workforce skills and efficiencies at 

another. Therefore, debates over program priorities will be less about policy or products 

and more about process and the impact on the workforce. As with the "science first" and 

"commercial first" schools, giving priority to regional interests can result in misdirecting 

resources. It places parochial interests above national interests and national spacepower. 

These differing forms of advocacy for space exploration can obviously affect how NASA 

pursues international and commercial partnerships. While technological, regional, and 

scientific advocates can be expected to be lukewarm to government-to-government 

international cooperation in exploration, the reality of limited budgets and need for such 

cooperation would suggest that these types of advocates would not be opposed. Even so, 

the Merchant culture of commercial advocates can be expected to be skeptical of 

contributions from other governments on a nonmarket basis. For them, it is the process by 

which space capabilities are acquired, not the product, that matters. In other words, 

government competition should be opposed. This is another area of Merchant and 

Guardian conflict. It would be worthwhile for NASA to explain, multiple times if need 

be, what it sees as a proper role of government in space exploration. Examples could 

include being a patron of science and other activities, being a reliable customer of 

commercially available goods and services, and being a fair and transparent regulator to 

ensure national security and public safety. 

Given the competing views, even among space exploration advocates, what does this say 

about the sustainability of an exploration enterprise that requires several decades? Again 

at the risk of caricature, advocates of long-term, civil space exploration tend to fall into 
different camps based on their underlying values. The traditional von Braun paradigm 

represents a Guardian approach. It sees space exploration as a government activity that 

adds indirectly to the spacepower of the Nation via new technologies, dual-use 

capabilities, and increased international influence. There are established government and 

private-sector interest groups that promote funding for technologies, systems, and 

partnerships with near-term benefits, especially scientific ones. 

Astronomer and author Carl Sagan was an advocate of robotic exploration of the solar 

system and the search for extraterrestrial intelligence. He also was an advocate of human 

spaceflight for one fundamental reason: 

every surviving civilization is obliged to become spacefaring—not 

because of exploratory or romantic zeal, but for the most practical reason 

imaginable: staying alive. . . . The more of us beyond the Earth, the greater 

the diversity of worlds we inhabit . . . then the safer the human species will 

be.31 

While initially skeptical of the scientific value of human spaceflight, Sagan became an 

advocate for noncommercial and nonmilitary reasons. The use of robots to obtain 

scientific knowledge was well and good, but humanity itself had a transcendent value, 

and human spaceflight could contribute to its survival. This Sagan paradigm is very much 

a Guardian approach, but one that does not yet have an established base in or outside of 

government, as the potential benefits are beyond the planning horizons of governments, 

not to mention industry. 

Gerard O'Neill was a physicist and author who became an advocate of space colonies, not 

necessarily on the Moon or Mars, but in free space. He proposed using space resources, 

via mining the Moon and asteroids, to construct large space habitats and solar-powered 

satellites to beam energy back to Earth.32 Space development, rather than space 

exploration, was the focus. It was to be carried out by private companies and quasigovernment corporations. In addition to the practical benefits of tapping space resources 

and energy, the O'Neill paradigm envisioned opportunities in the image of the American 

frontier. The images of self-sustaining human space settlements appeal to both Merchant 

and Guardian cultures and with plausible, nearer term steps. Beyond just survival, the 

O'Neill image offered a way to advance American (or Western, to be more general) 

values beyond Earth. Unfortunately, the economics of the O'Neill scenario are not 

realizable with current space capabilities. Even so, the attraction of this encompassing 

paradigm is as powerful today among space advocates as the one advocated by von 

Braun. 

The point of reviewing the varying visions of space exploration and development is to 

observe that each represents decades-long efforts. They are adaptable and could persist 

even in the face of temporary political or fiscal setbacks. Like the "Vision for Space 

Exploration," they represent directions and purposes to which many different types of 

space activity could make contributions. 
The space capabilities implied by successful space settlements, particularly those in 

which the United States is a leader, also represent a gigantic increase in the Nation's 

spacepower. Unfortunately, it is not clear that such capabilities are realizable, although 

many advocates believe they are. Two important questions are: can humans "live off the 

land" in space and function independently of Earth for long periods, and are there 

economically useful activities in space that can sustain human communities there? 

If the answer to both questions is yes, then the long-term future in space includes human 

space settlements. If the answer to both is no, then space remains a place that one might 

visit briefly for science or tourism, much like going to Mount Everest or other remote 

locations. If the answer is that one can, in part, live off the land or at least be reliably 

supplied, then one can imagine space as akin to Antarctica—a place for science, tourism, 

and habitation by government employees and contractors. Finally, if one cannot live off 

the land, but the tasks to be performed are economically attractive, then one can imagine 

habitats like the North Sea oil platforms. These locations may be privately owned and 

operated, but they cannot really be called settlements (see table 7–1). 

Table 7–1. Viability of Space Settlement

These outcomes do not preclude other motivations, such as protection of Earth from 

hazardous asteroids or the protection of U.S. and allied space infrastructure from hostile 

attacks. The point is, we do not know which of these outcomes represents our long-term 

future. Advocates and skeptics may believe one outcome or another is most likely, but no

one actually knows. Determining the future of humans in space would be a watershed 

event not only for spacepower, but also for the United States and humanity. Just as space 

science can be organized around great questions (How did the solar system form? Is there 

life elsewhere in the universe?), so might human spaceflight be organized to answer 

similarly great questions. One of the purposes of human spaceflight is to explore the 

unknown and see what humans are capable of doing, where they are capable of going, 

and what communities they can sustain. Taking risks to get that knowledge would seem 

to be a worthwhile activity for nations that are technically sophisticated and wealthy 

enough to do so. 

Policy Challenges for the Second Space Age 

The period from the launch of Sputnik to the last Apollo mission can be considered the 

first space age—driven by Cold War competition across civil and military sectors. It is 

unclear when the second space age might begin; some say it started with the launch of the 

space shuttle, and others say it will start with the end of shuttle flights in 2010. More 

commercial and international involvement, as well as deep cooperation and conflict 
across public and private sectors, will characterize the second space age and the role of 

Merchant and Guardian cultures. 

With stable national space policies, many old debates have long remained settled. Save 

for historians, it is difficult to recall the intense debates over military versus civilian 

leadership in human spaceflight in the 1960s or the U.S. Government's resistance to 

commercial space innovations in the 1980s. New debates over spacepower in the second 

space age will reflect both the growing strength of the Merchants and the worrying 

weaknesses of the Guardians. As discussed earlier, government space programs are 

increasingly facing difficulties in delivering capabilities on time and on budget. Limited 

fiscal resources and concerns over lack of management skills have stoked interest in 

outsourcing and privatizing government space functions (for example, launch 

communications, remote sensing, and navigation). Whether it makes sense to change 

responsibilities for some or any of these functions will make for much debate. 

The civil space sector, notably NASA, also sees potential advantages in relying more on 

the private sector for launch services and other operational capabilities. At the same time, 

the private sector is looking to open new markets, particularly in the area of space 

tourism. These markets are not directly of interest to the government, but the dual-use 

capabilities they could support are. The ongoing issue for the civil space sector likely will 

be what kinds of mutual interest there might be in human space exploration for the 

commercial, scientific, international, and perhaps the national security communities. 

Exploration can be hard to justify on commercial, military, or even purely scientific 

grounds (one will not find "exploration" among the top priorities of the decadal surveys 

done by the National Academy of Sciences), but the conduct of exploration can create 

opportunities for commercial, scientific, and even military interests. Identifying and 

acting on those mutual interests will be an ongoing part of the second space age as the 

United States establishes a lunar outpost and prepares for Mars. 

The priority for NASA when it returns to the Moon for the first time in decades will be to 

do so successfully, safely, and affordably. In moving beyond the space shuttle and low 

Earth orbit operations, NASA is effectively learning to fly again. Just as Gemini was a 

necessary forerunner to Apollo, so too is the Moon a necessary precursor to Mars. Not 

only technologies but also organizational and management skills need to be 

demonstrated. The International Space Station was, and is, a massive educational 

experience in the assembly and operation of a multinational space facility, and the 

establishment of a lunar outpost will be as well. This effort will be different from the 

space station, however. Both international and commercial partners will be involved. 

Commercial involvement in a return to the Moon has been the subject of much 

speculation, but little is definitive.33 Proposals have been made for extracting platinum 

metals to use in commercial fuel cells as part of a global hydrogen economy, mining of 

helium-3 for fusion reactors, and the construction of solar-power beaming stations on the 

lunar surface or in free space using lunar materials. Other proposals see commercial firms 

separating oxygen from lunar rocks and providing support services to government 
facilities on the Moon, or even offering tourism and entertainment activities. Some of 

these endeavors may make commercial sense, but it is possible that none will. 

In the near term, expectations are that the U.S. Government will want to ensure that 

necessary research and technology development occurs to support a lunar outpost, that a 

robust space transportation network is created (which may or may not be governmentowned in the long term), that accurate maps and surveys of the Moon exist (we have 

better maps of Mars today than we do of the Moon), and that reliable communications 

and navigation services are available at the Moon. In short, the government should ensure 

that basic services are present to enable scientific and commercial opportunities, but it 

will not be a governmental responsibility to do everything possible on the Moon. It 

simply will not have the resources. As a policy matter, the most difficult area for 

Merchant and Guardian cultures likely will not be how to provide any particular good or 

service, but what legal rights private parties have on and, most crucially, on the way to 

the Moon. This is not an area in which the United States can or should act unilaterally. It 

affects what values are recognized beyond the Earth, and therefore the type and character 

of spacepower available to the United States. 

Space Property Rights 

Current international law recognizes the continued ownership of objects placed in space 

by governments or private entities. Similarly, resources removed from outer space (such 

as lunar samples from the Apollo missions) can be and are subject to ownership. Other 

sorts of rights in space, such as to intellectual property and spectrum, are also recognized. 

Article II of the 1967 Outer Space Treaty, however, specifically bars national 

appropriation of the Moon or other celestial bodies by claims of sovereignty or other 

means. It also says that states shall be responsible for the activities of persons under their 

jurisdiction or control. Thus, the central issue is the ability to confer and recognize real 

property rights on land, including in situ resources found on the Moon and other celestial 

bodies. 

In common law, a sovereign is generally required to recognize private property claims. 

Thus, the Outer Space Treaty, by barring claims of sovereignty, is usually thought to bar 

private property claims. Many legal scholars in the International Institute of Space Law 

and other organizations support that view. Other scholars, however, make a distinction 

between sovereignty and property and point to civil law that recognizes property rights 

independent of sovereignty.34 It has also been argued that while article II of the treaty 

prohibits territorial sovereignty, it does not prohibit private appropriation. The provision 

of the Outer Space Treaty requiring state parties to be responsible for the activities of 

persons under their jurisdiction or control leaves the door open to agreements or 

processes that allow them to recognize and confer property rights, even under common 

law. 

Current international space treaties are built on the assumption that all matters can and 

should trace back to states. This is in contrast to admiralty law and the growing field of 

commercial arbitration in which the interests and responsibilities of owners, not 
necessarily the state, were the legal foundation. It can be argued that the Outer Space 

Treaty was not the final word on real property rights in space even within the 

international space law community, as drafters of the 1979 Moon Treaty felt it necessary 

to be more explicit on this point. The treaty states: 

Article 11. (1) The moon and its natural resources are the common 

heritage of mankind. (2) The moon is not subject to national appropriation 

by any claim of sovereignty, by means of use or occupation, or by any 

other means. (3) Neither the surface nor the subsurface of the moon . . . 

shall become property of any State, international intergovernmental or 

nongovernmental organization, national organization or nongovernmental 

entity or of any natural person [emphasis added]. The placement of 

personnel, space vehicles, equipment, facilities, stations . . . shall not 

create a right of ownership over the surface or subsurface of the moon or 

any areas thereof. The foregoing provisions are without prejudice to the 

international regime referred to in Paragraph 5 of this Article . . . (5) 

State parties to this Agreement hereby undertake to establish an 

international regime . . . to govern the exploitation of the natural resources 

of the moon as such exploitation is about to become feasible . . . (7) The 

main purposes of the international regime to be established shall include: 

a) The orderly and safe development of the natural resources of the moon, 

b) the rational management of those resources, c) the expansion of 

opportunities in the use of those resources, d) an equitable sharing by all 

State parties in the benefits derived from those resources, whereby the 

interests and needs of the developing countries, as well as the efforts of 

those countries, which have contributed either directly or indirectly to the 

exploration of the moon shall be given special consideration.35 

Article 11 was the most controversial aspect of the Moon Treaty when it was introduced. 

The Outer Space Treaty had already excluded claims of national appropriation, and this 

provision is repeated in article 11, part 2. Article 11 goes further, however, in part 3 to 

exclude property claims of any sort, and if any benefits are derived, they are presumably 

to be shared in accordance with the "common heritage" provision of article 11, part 1. 

Even the exercise of effective control of a region, as in placing a permanent base, would 

not support a claim of ownership by any entity. There is no mention of any limitations 

that would be placed on a regime controlling nonterrestrial resources or what mechanisms 

would be considered to resolve disputes. One might argue that article 11 prejudges the 

design of an international regime for the orderly and safe development of the Moon in 

that a system of internationally recognized property rights could, in fact, be the more 

rational way to manage those resources, expand opportunities for their use, and equitably 

share the benefits therein derived. 

Furthermore, privacy and the right of persons to be secure in their dwellings are not rights 

supported by the Moon Treaty. Article 15 reads: 
Article 15(1). All space vehicles, equipment, facilities, stations and 

installations on the moon shall be open to other State parties. Such State 

parties shall give reasonable advance notice of a projected visit, in order 

that appropriate consultations may be held and that maximum precautions 

may be taken to assure safety and to avoid interference with normal 

operations in the facility to be visited.36 

No limits are placed on the reach of article 15, and the right to inspect space-based 

facilities would presumably extend to individual quarters and personal effects and papers. 

If state parties owned all facilities on the Moon and all persons on the Moon were state 

employees, an inspection regime, based on reciprocity, would seem to be a simple 

requirement. If some facilities are privately owned and their occupants are private 

citizens (which the Moon Treaty does not forbid), then a broad inspection requirement 

like article 15 would necessarily supersede those privacy rights enjoyed in the United 

States and other democracies. Thus, the Moon and other celestial bodies would be 

regions where inhabitants enjoyed fewer liberties than in the United States or other 

nations on Earth. 

The 1979 Moon Treaty may not appear very relevant since the United States and almost 

all other spacefaring nations did not sign it and none has ratified it.37 However, the view 

that real property rights are forbidden by international law is widely prevalent. This in 

turn creates uncertainty in the minds of potential private sector partners and is 

inconsistent with the goals enunciated by the President and Congress in supporting the 

"Vision for Space Exploration." At minimum, real property rights in space are legally 

ambiguous and the United States need not accept flat statements that the Outer Space 

Treaty per se forbids such rights. 

There is a wide variety of options for the establishment of a system of real property rights 

in space. These could include negotiation of a new international treaty to replace the 

Moon Treaty, extend existing international structures (such as the World Trade 

Organization), and use international arbitration mechanisms (for example, the London 

Court of International Arbitration). Alternatively, other regimes, such as the International 

Seabed Authority, could be modified to enable more predictable exploitation without 

recognizing private property rights. Or they could create a claims registry that would 

leave definition of a recognition regime to future specific cases. These options 

intentionally exclude more extreme positions, such as rejection of the Outer Space 

Treaty, or the unilateral assertion that the United States recognizes private property 

claims. Such actions would not engender international acceptance and the predictability 

required for such claims to be effective. 

Conclusion 

Spacepower encompasses all aspects of national power: military, economic, political, and 

even cultural as represented by the values that shape the Nation's space activities. The 

differing outlooks of Merchant and Guardian cultures are central aspects of today's space 

policy debates and can be expected to continue no matter what the human future in space 
turns out to be. The commercial space sector is continuing to grow and diversify. While it 

is easy to overestimate the potential of space commerce, weaknesses in the management 

and technical skills of the national security and civil space sectors are arguably a greater 

concern for the Nation's spacepower than the rate of growth of private space enterprise. 

In short, Guardian weaknesses are a more serious problem than Merchant strengths, as 

there is no substitute for Guardian responsibilities assuring national security and public 

safety. 

In the national security sector, the key challenges will be to strengthen the ability to 

implement and execute major space acquisition programs and partner with commercial 

interests to shape the international environment to the advantage of the United States and 

its allies. In the civil space sector, the key challenges will be to implement the "Vision for 

Space Exploration" in an affordable manner and create partnerships with commercial and 

international interests to ensure the long-term sustainability of human exploration beyond 

low Earth orbit. The capabilities created by the successful establishment of a lunar 

outpost and human missions to Mars will add greatly to the Nation's spacepower. 

There are many uncertainties with meeting these challenges because they require 

government agencies to work across traditional lines, partner with organizations having 

very different worldviews, and integrate policy, acquisition, and operational functions 

more thoroughly. Highly complex systems tend to create internal stovepipes that control 

the amount of information with which decisionmakers have to deal. For space systems, 

this can lead to disconnects between the acquisition and operational communities, and 

national policy objectives. Keeping these communities in sync with evolving world 

conditions is a major and daunting challenge for U.S. agencies and the entire executive 

branch. 

Human and robotic exploration of space is a decades-long effort that has no clear end, but 

there are vastly different potential outcomes for humans' long-term future in space. 

Humans could live permanently in thriving communities beyond Earth or embark on 

limited to relatively brief expeditions and not establish a permanent presence. If it is 

assumed that humans are not permanently limited to the Earth and that the future exercise 

of spacepower includes humans living and working in space, then the questions become: 

who will make these expeditions, and what values will they hold? If they are Americans, 

then it is to be hoped that there will be room for Merchant as well as Guardian cultures on 

the Moon, Mars, and beyond. 

Legal issues will become increasingly more important as the "Vision for Space 

Exploration" proceeds and humans attempt to expand farther and more permanently into 

space. In exercising spacepower, the United States should seek to ensure that its citizens 

have at least as many rights and protections in space, including the right to own property, 

as they do on Earth. Whether such rights would be as complete as those in the United 

States would be the subject of negotiation and debate. Simply put, however, the Moon 

and other celestial bodies should not be a place of fewer liberties than those enjoyed on 

Earth. 
Recognizing conflicts between Merchants and Guardians is only a first step. The pursuit 

of spacepower should serve to increase national power, whether measured in economic, 

military, or political terms, as a way to advance American values and interests. This does 

not mean the pursuit of an isolationist or unilateral approach by the U.S. Government or 

the United States as a whole. The reality is that the United States must be engaged in 

shaping the international environment, and the Nation needs partners and friends to 

succeed. The task is to craft partnerships and strategies with Merchants and Guardians 

worldwide as human activities of all kinds expand into space.

Notes

1. I am grateful for the comments I received and the lively discussions I participated in at workshops 

and seminars hosted by the National Defense University. I am also grateful for comments I 

received from colleagues who could not attend these sessions in person. The chapter also draws on 

prior works, in particular: Scott Pace, "Merchants and Guardians," in Merchants and Guardians: 

Balancing U.S. Interests in Global Space Commerce, ed. John M. Logsdon and Russell J. Acker 

(Washington, DC: Space Policy Institute, George Washington University, May 1999) Scott Pace, 

"Merchants and Guardians in the New Millennium," in Space Policy in the Twenty-first Century, 

ed. W. Henry Lambright (Baltimore: The Johns Hopkins University Press, 2003) Dana J. Johnson, 

Scott Pace, and C. Bryan Gabbard, Space: Emerging Options for National Power, MR–517 (Santa 

Monica, CA: RAND, 1998). NASA identification is for biographical purposes only. 

2. Ronald Reagan, "Speech at Moscow State University—May 31, 1988," in The American Reader, 

ed. Diane Ravitch (New York: HarperCollins, 1990), 364–365. 

3. Simon Worden, "Forget about space dominance: U.S. interests should start focusing on space 

competence," Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists (March–April 2006), 21–23. 

4. Air Force Basic Doctrine, Air Force Doctrine Document 1 (Washington, DC: U.S. Air Force 

Headquarters, September 1997). 

5. Much of this discussion is drawn from Dana J. Johnson, Scott Pace, and C. Bryan Gabbard, Space: 

Emerging Options for National Power, MR–517 (Santa Monica, CA: RAND, 1998), chapter 2. 

6. General Henry H. Arnold, USAF, Global Mission (New York: Harper and Brothers, 1949), 290–

291. 

7. Having low-cost access to space is useful in its own right and can be an additional deterrent to the 

entry of potential competitors. Similarly, the provision of free, high-quality navigation signals 

from global positioning systems makes it more difficult to raise commercial funds for competing 

systems. States may, of course, choose to build such capabilities for their own reasons, but they 

will bear the costs more directly. 

8. Unfortunately, the exercise of spacepower by field commanders would require a more technical 

and detailed analysis of specific space capabilities than we have room for in this chapter. 

9. Johnson, Pace, and Gabbard. 

10. Air Force Doctrine Document 2–2, Space Operations (Maxwell AFB, AL: Air Force Doctrine 

Center, November 27, 2001), 54. 

11. I am indebted to Dwayne Day for the term von Braun paradigm. 

12. Donella H. Meadows, Dennis L. Meadows, Jørgen Randers, and William W. Behrens III, Limits to 

Growth (New York: Universe Books, 1972). See <www.nss.org/settlement/L5news/index.html> 

for a brief history of the L5 Society. 

13. Interestingly, this view of space did not find much support outside Anglophone cultures. Most 

international advocates of space development saw large-scale human activities in space as useful 

in building cooperation among existing societies, not in building new ones. 
14. During the Civil War, President Lincoln signed several key legislative initiatives for the American 

frontier such as the 1862 Homestead Act, the Morrill Land-Grant Colleges Act, and the Pacific 

Railway Acts of 1862 and 1864. 

15. The Space Foundation, The Space Report: The Guide to Global Space Activity (Colorado Springs: 

The Space Foundation, 2006). 

16. For a deeper treatment of choice, see Charles Wolf, Jr., Markets or Governments: Choosing 

between Imperfect Alternatives (Cambridge: MIT Press, 1988). 

17. I am indebted to Jim Bennett for first using these terms together. This discussion is drawn from 

my 1999 paper of the same title. 

18. Scott Pace, "Merchants and Guardians," in Merchants and Guardians: Balancing U.S. Interests in 

Global Space Commerce, ed. John M. Logsdon and Russell J. Acker (Washington, DC: Space 

Policy Institute, George Washington University, May 1999). 

19. Columbia Accident Investigation Board Report, vol. 1 (Washington, DC: NASA and U.S. 

Government Printing Office, August 2003), 209, available at <http://caib.nasa.gov/>. 

20. John M. Logsdon, "A Failure of National Leadership," in Critical Issues in the History of 

Spaceflight (Washington, DC: NASA, 2006), 270. 

21. See <www.whitehouse.gov/infocus/space/vision.html>. 

22. Michael Griffin, remarks to the National Space Club, Washington, DC, February 9, 2005. 

23. John Marburger, keynote address, 44th Robert H. Goddard Memorial Symposium, Greenbelt, MD, 

March 15, 2006. 

24. Office of Science and Technology Policy, Executive Office of the President, U.S. National Space 

Policy (Washington, DC: The White House, August 31, 2006). 

25. Robert G. Joseph, remarks on the President's National Space Policy at The George C. Marshall 

Institute, Washington, DC, December 13, 2006. 

26. Andy Pasztor, "Air Force May Hire Outsiders to Oversee Projects," The Wall Street Journal, 

December 28, 2006, 3. 

27. John Logsdon, "Missing the Point?" Space News, November 6, 2006. 

28. A peer competitor is a state capable of fielding multiple types and robust numbers of both 

emerging and current weapons, then developing a concept of operations to realize the full potential 

of this mix. Its goal is to capture a vital interest of the United States and then defeat the military 

response. 

29. Petter Stålenheim, Damien Fruchart, Wuyi Omitoogun, and Catalina Perdomo, "Military 

Expenditure," in SIPRI Yearbook 2006: Armaments, Disarmament and International Security 

(New York: Oxford University Press on behalf of Stockholm International Peace Research 

Institute, June 2006). 

30. Thomas Friedman, The World is Flat (New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2005). 

31. Carl Sagan, Pale Blue Dot: A Vision of the Human Future in Space (New York: Random House, 

1994), 371. 

32. Gerard K. O'Neill, The High Frontier (Princeton: Space Studies Institute Press, 1989). 

33. Rick Tumlinson and Erin Medlicott, eds., Return to the Moon (Ontario, Canada: Collectors Guide 

Publishing Inc., Apogee Books, November 2005). 

34. Wayne N. White, "Real Property Rights in Outer Space," in Proceedings of the 40th Colloquium on 

the Law of Outer Space, American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics on behalf of the 

International Institute of Space Law (1998), 370. 

35. Agreement Governing the Activities of States on the Moon and Other Celestial Bodies, United 

Nations Office for Outer Space Affairs (1979), available at 

<www.unoosa.org/oosa/SpaceLaw/moon. html>. 

36. Ibid. 

37. Ibid. 
Chapter 8:

Economic Development of the Solar System: 

The Heart of a 21st-century Spacepower Theory

Dennis Wingo

The current definition of spacepower in use by the United States is incomplete, and a 

"geocentric" mindset has become an embedded assumption in the development of 

national spacepower theory. This mindset must be expanded in order to provide options 

to our nation's current and future leaders in navigating through the difficulties that define 

the 21st century. The change has begun within the top echelon of our elected leadership 

but has yet to be integrated into the thought processes of the majority of spacepower 

theorists and government agencies responsible for science, exploration, and national 

security.1 It is this author's position that the time has come to extend the economic reach 

of mankind into the solar system to create a multiplanet civilization with a resource and 

energy base that dwarfs our present single planet system. Integrating this worldview into 

American spacepower theory and practice will bring tremendous economic and national 

security benefits. This chapter will explore why this shift is needed and how it might 

unfold.

Current World Status and the Linkage to Spacepower Theory 

As we enter the first decades of the 21st century, profound challenges confront the United 

States and the family of nations in transcending the limitations of hydrocarbon energy 

and other resources. The U.S. Census Bureau estimates that the population of our planet 

will continue to grow from today's 6.5 billion to an estimated 9.4 billion in the year 

2050.2 Beyond this, the expanding major powers of Asia, principally China and India, 

with the majority of the Earth's population, aspire to the same level of affluence that 

Americans, Europeans, and the Japanese enjoy. This will further strain the resources of 

our single planet, and the current nontechnical geocentric solutions envisioned by many 

well-meaning leaders point toward an extended period of economic contraction and war 

over a shrinking resource base. Worse yet, the diversion of resources to preserve the 

status quo of a single planet civilization will likely result in a period of population and 

industrial collapse as resources are exhausted due to the lack of investment in technical 

innovation. 

Therefore, we must develop a new spacepower theory in the context of our times 

reflecting the challenges that face our people, our nation, and our world in order to 

protect our liberty, improve our lives, and continue our collective and individual pursuit 

of happiness. This spacepower theory must provide hope and illuminate a path toward a 

positive, peaceful, and affluent future for all the citizens of the world. In order to catalyze 

this, the American free enterprise system must be enabled toward the goal of the 
economic development of the solar system. These perceptual shifts have fundamental 

implications for the shape of spacepower theory. 

Definitions and Context 

Considering that various definitions of spacepower theory exist, this chapter adopts the 

one that best supports the construction of its premise. The following definition is from 

James Hyatt: "Spacepower is defined as the ability of a state or nonstate actor to achieve 

its goals and objectives in the presence of other actors on the world stage through . . . 

exploitation of the space environment."3 This definition carries broad connotations to 

include commercial activities, scientific researchers, and other actors. However, this 

definition embraces, as do all current spacepower definitions, an underlying assumption 

or mindset defined as geocentric. The definition of geocentric within the context of a 

discussion of spacepower theory is as "a mindset and public policy that sees spacepower 

and its application as focused primarily on actions, actors, and influences on earthly 

powers, the earth itself, and its nearby orbital environs."

The geocentric mindset is a key assumption undergirding the last 40 years of spacepower 

theory. This assumption became a foundational principle during the administration of 

President John F. Kennedy and Secretary of Defense Robert McNamara. This was not 

always the case. In the 1950s, the Dwight Eisenhower administration supported a military 

presence on the Moon in the form of an outpost as the ultimate high ground, beyond the 

reach of ballistic missiles, as a deterrent to a Soviet first strike nuclear capability. This 

was laid out in the Project Horizon Report, a classified (at the time) document that was 

basically the first serious U.S. military study of the uses of space beyond low Earth orbit 

(LEO).4 The U.S. Armed Forces' interest in a lunar military base was curtailed by the 

creation of the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA), a civilian 

agency given the lead role in the race to place humans on the Moon as defined by 

President Kennedy. With the creation of NASA, military space assets (principally Army) 

were transferred to the new agency, along with the budgets for space systems 

development.

With that divorce, space beyond geosynchronous Earth orbit (GEO) was excised from 

military planning, activities, and spacepower theory development. This was further 

reinforced by Secretary McNamara's decision to embrace mutual assured destruction as 

the cornerstone of U.S. strategic policy along with ballistic missile submarines as the 

survivable leg of the triad of nuclear deterrence. The functional result of that decision 

meant that anything beyond passive military satellites was "bad" and "destabilizing."5

This effectively removed the military from any space mission beyond communications 

satellites in GEO, reconnaissance in LEO, and the global positioning system in medium 

Earth orbit. This remains the status quo today, with the singular exception of the Ballistic 

Missile Defense Organization's (now the Missile Defense Agency) Clementine mission to 

the Moon in early 1994.6 However, the intervening years have brought new concerns to 

light that signal a shift in defense policy interests beyond LEO.
There has been recent acknowledgment in military circles that near Earth objects (NEOs) 

are a potential threat to our nation, and a joint NASA/U.S. Air Force project called the 

Lincoln Near-Earth Asteroid Research (LINEAR) program has dramatically improved 

the search for NEOs using existing terrestrial telescopes.7 However, this is still a 

geocentric interest as the emphasis is on their danger to the Earth; there is no attempt to 

characterize these objects for their resource potential, which is easily accomplished with 

the same assets.

With the death of the Apollo program in the early 1970s, NASA's role in shaping an 

expansive national spacepower theory was curtailed as well. NASA became geocentric in 

outlook, in manned spaceflight, and in the human development of space. This shift is 

especially important to note today, given that the same forces (the perceived threat to the 

terrestrial environment by human activity) are at work, incorporating the same geocentric 

mindset that dismisses space as a part of the solution set for our problems here on Earth. 

The exception to this has been the very successful robotic spacecraft missions that have 

probed the planets and traveled beyond the confines of the solar system. However, this 

exception proves the rule as NASA's planetary robotic exploration program has been the 

sole province of scientific inquiry with no consideration of the economic potential of any 

solar system bodies visited. In terms of shaping a broad national spacepower theory, the 

White House and the Office of Science and Technology Policy (OSTP) assumed this role 

mostly by default while the Department of Defense continued to be limited in scope to 

geocentric applications of passive military strategic and tactical systems.

The Ronald Reagan administration strongly supported a role for the armed services in the 

development of strategic defense. While it went beyond the confines of McNamara era 

policy, it still exhibited a geocentric posture focused on ballistic missiles launched by 

terrestrial adversaries. The White House and other entities showed a trace of support for 

the development of a new spacepower theory and implementation that incorporated 

economic activity. The National Academy of Sciences hosted a public symposium in 

Washington, DC, in October 1984 that addressed the issue of the exploration of the 

Moon, Mars, and beyond. This symposium resulted in a book, Lunar Bases and Space 

Activities in the 21st Century. In the keynote address, Presidential science advisor and 

OSTP director George Keyworth had this to say:

I think we have to ask, right at the outset, where we go from the lunar 

base? What steps should we be taking in parallel with the lunar base, and 

what comes after it? Do we go to Mars, and if so, why? Do we try to visit 

an asteroid? Remember that much of the momentum of our space program 

was lost after Apollo because we treated the Moon landing as an end in 

itself. This time we should know enough to define and update our goals in 

space in broad terms related to our future, not in terms of individual 

projects. And we should cast as wide a net as possible in creating this 

vision of our future, involving the American public and being driven by 

their enthusiasm as well as our own.8
This speech, and those that followed, still showed commitment to the bifurcation of space 

efforts: space exploration and development (primarily science and exploration driven) 

was the sole province of NASA, while military efforts focused on geocentric strategic 

defense. There was no sense of a national spacepower theory that melded the larger 

interests of the Nation and its people into a coherent foundation for policy. Keyworth 

asked the right questions in his speech&#mdash;questions we still seek answers to today.

While the George H.W. Bush administration strongly supported manned exploration of 

the Moon and Mars for scientific purposes, economic development remained the province 

of poorly funded and organized civilian space advocacy movements. It is only with the 

George W. Bush administration's "Vision for Space Exploration" (VSE) that economic 

development of the solar system has been embraced as an underlying rationale by the 

government. This new rationale, as mentioned by President Bush in his January 2004 

speech announcing the VSE and amplified by OSTP since, is a startling departure from 

previous policies regarding space exploration and development and is the first true break 

from the geocentric outlook by policymakers.

John Marburger, director of OSTP, elaborated on the new policy in a speech at the Robert 

H. Goddard Memorial Symposium in March 2006:

As I see it, questions about the vision boil down to whether we want to 

incorporate the Solar System in our economic sphere, or not. Our national 

policy, declared by President Bush and endorsed by Congress last 

December in the NASA authorization act, affirms that "The fundamental 

goal of this vision is to advance U.S. scientific, security, and economic 

interests through a robust space exploration program" [emphasis added].9

In order to clearly contrast the departure that this new policy represents, the equivalent 

statement by the National Academies of Science in 1961 was that "scientific exploration 

of the moon and planets should be clearly stated as the ultimate objective of the U.S. 

space program for the foreseeable future."10

The above statement had been the guiding principle during the Apollo era all the way 

until the Bush speech of 2004 and Marburger's Goddard talk of 2006. Marburger became 

even more explicit in his speech in describing what the new space policy means in terms 

of breaking with past programs:

I want to stress how very different this kind of thinking is from the 

arguments that motivated America's first great space vision, the Apollo 

program. . . . The ultimate goal is not to impress others, or merely to 

explore our planetary system, but to use accessible space for the benefit of 

humankind. It is a goal that is not confined to a decade or a century. Nor is 

it confined to a single nearby destination, or to a fleeting dash to plant a 

flag. The idea is to begin preparing now for a future in which the material 

trapped in the Sun's vicinity is available for incorporation into our way of 

life [emphasis added].
As Marburger stated, this new policy, endorsed by the President and the Congress, shifts 

our nation's space exploration goal to embrace the economic development of the solar 

system as a core principle. In this departure, Marburger conclusively answered the 

questions proposed by his predecessor, Keyworth, 22 years before. The Marburger 

speech is the culmination of 50 years of space policy development, which must now be 

incorporated into a 21st-century spacepower theory. 

We now have 22 years of further history that help to clarify the problems that confront 

the United States and the world in maintaining our civilization. We have 22 years of 

further scientific exploration by NASA and other space agencies that give us a much 

clearer picture of the potential resources obtainable in the solar system. We have as a 

fundamental construct the principle of private enterprise, the engine that has powered our 

entire national development. Therefore, by national temperament, this moves free 

enterprise and commercial activities to the forefront of national spacepower theory 

development. However, NASA, the Department of Defense, and other executive agencies 

have yet to integrate the new executive policy or economic development into a 

comprehensive spacepower theory.

The questions for our generation then become: 

• What form of economic development and activity will be the focus of these 

efforts? 

• What is the form of the "material trapped in the Sun's vicinity," and how will we 

access these resources? 

• Will this be command-driven, like the Apollo era and the current military 

industrial complex, or do we as a nation fully embrace the free enterprise system 

and unleash it into the solar system? 

There are legal ramifications related to this development as well. While there has been 

considerable debate about the ability to use the economic resources of solar system 

bodies, article 1 of the Outer Space Treaty of 1967 clearly states that "outer space, 

including the moon and other celestial bodies, shall be free for exploration and use 

[emphasis added] by all States without discrimination of any kind, on a basis of equality 

and in accordance with international law, and there shall be free access to all areas of 

celestial bodies."11

Conflicts over interpretation aside, for the sake of argument we will assume that resource 

rights can be obtained. In the context of a spacepower theory, the economic development

of the solar system provides new options that allow us to positively address and indeed 

transcend many of the most pressing problems that our planetary civilization must 

confront in the 21st century, therefore improving our economic prospects while reducing 

some of the pressure toward warfare over the limited resources of the Earth.

The development of a spacepower theory must also assimilate the perspective that we are 

a planetary civilization. Even though the United States is one nation, it also is the core 

member of a planetary civilization that has been evolving for several centuries. This 
places a unique responsibility for us as a nation, in developing our spacepower theory, to 

provide a path for other nations to achieve our level of civilization without the inevitable 

conflicts that limit our vision to a single planet's resource guarantees. The resources of 

the solar system will provide the wealth to make this happen, and a new spacepower 

theory should incorporate that as a fundamental principle. In making bold statements 

regarding the ability of free enterprise to contribute to solving problems, it is necessary to 

state the nature of the problems that we face, construct a desirable endpoint that 

illustrates the potential benefits, and then elaborate on steps to be taken to reach the 

desired results.

The Problem Statement, Energy, and Resources 

This chapter posits that free enterprise has the capacity to play the key role in the 

expansion of human civilization into the solar system. This expansion is a natural result 

and consequence of a planetary civilization such as we have today whose population is 

growing beyond the carrying capacity of our single planet. The World Wildlife Fund 

(WWF), in its 2006 Living Planet Report, suggests that "by 2050 humanity will demand 

resources at double the rate at which the Earth can generate them."12

The organization's perspective has been shared by various writers dating back to the late 

18th century such as Thomas Malthus, who wrote the first treatise on exponential 

population growth.13 Indeed, the Malthusian perspective can be considered the 

quintessential exposition of the geocentric mindset, as he originally postulated: "That, in 

time, because of an ever increasing population rate, man will come up against a ceiling, 

one created by the fact that the world's [emphasis added] resources needed for life, are, 

limited. Once these resources are exhausted, or spoiled, life as we know it will come to 

an end.”

So far, mankind and Western civilization have been able to transcend successive limits to 

growth through the advance of technology and the increasing use of more compact forms 

of inexpensive and portable energy. The advance of technology continues to confound 

those who predict our doom, and yet at some point the sheer number of people and their 

desires for the same level of prosperity that the Western world enjoys threaten to 

overwhelm the currently favored solutions that rest upon a geocentric viewpoint. The 

WWF/Malthusian perspective illustrates one end of the political spectrum, but there are 

others who are reading from the same pages.

In a December 2006 interview in the Wall Street Journal, General Charles F. Wald, 

USAF (Ret.), called for a complete redefinition of energy security and asserted that the 

U.S. military could no longer fully protect our energy interests around the world.14 Since 

his retirement in 2006, General Wald, along with General P.X. Kelly, USMC (Ret.), 28th

Commandant of the Marine Corps, and Fredrick Smith, chief executive officer of the 

Fedex Corporation, have helped to found the Securing America's Future Energy (SAFE) 

out of their joint concern for our energy future. Legendary oil tycoon T. Boone Pickens 

echoed this concern on his personal Web site: "The Achilles heel of the United States is 
that we're using 20 percent of the oil in the world a day and we have less than 5 percent 

of the supply."15

Another concurring voice is that of Matthew Simmons, chairman and chief executive 

officer of Simmons and Company International, a Houston-based bank that is an 

investment leader in the oil industry. Mr. Simmons wrote in 2005 that world demand for 

oil is going to grow to over 130 million barrels of oil per day by 2030 and that the 

capacity to meet that demand with the existing resources of oil is not possible.16 The point 

is that inexpensive petroleum energy, which has enabled the growth of global population 

from 1 billion in the 19th century to 6.5 billion today, is a resource that will effectively 

cease to exist no later than the latter part of this century in even the most optimistic 

scenario. Without the portable energy for transportation fuel that oil represents, it is 

highly unlikely that the current standard of global prosperity can be maintained, much 

less extended to several billion more of our fellow global citizens. This is not a problem 

only if the discomfort that a population reduction down to a billion souls would entail is 

discounted. 

Furthermore, the shift in wealth to the oil-producing countries, most of which are not 

particularly friendly to the United States, represents a near-term strategic threat to our 

long-term economic health. Until the early 1970s, the United States was virtually selfsufficient in petroleum resources. During World War II, the United States was an oil 

exporter. This was a source of foreign exchange and wealth to the Nation that has been 

dramatically reversed in the past 35 years. Other threats related to the availability of oil in 

the 21st century continue to shift the balance of wealth and industrial power away from 

the United States. In the era before the new century, most of the oil produced by foreign 

entities had very little local demand. This is changing as Middle Eastern nations and 

others use the local availability of oil to fuel a dramatic growth in their own industrial 

base. This accelerates the accumulation of wealth in these nations as their industrial 

potential increases along with sales of products derived from these new industries. 

Additionally, General Wald estimates that between 75 and 90 percent of the world's 

petroleum reserves are in the hands of state-owned companies that are quite willing to use 

oil as a weapon in political disputes.17 In late 2006, Russia wrested control of the billions 

of dollars' worth of investments that Shell Oil made in Siberia and turned it over to the 

state-owned Gazprom.18 A similar effort has consummated with British Petroleum. 

Venezuela and Ecuador have both nationalized foreign oil industry holdings as well. 

With ownership comes profits, and these profits are increasingly used in ways not 

beneficial to the United States. Venezuela, as just one example, uses its newfound oil 

wealth to purchase arms rather than to reinvest in the local economy.19 In February 2007, 

the Washington Times and other news sources published articles concerning the creation 

of a natural gas cartel, similar to the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries, 

between Russia, Qatar, and Iran.20 As this trend accelerates with the depletion of oil and 

gas resources in the Western world, the options of the United States will become 

increasingly limited. 
How does the economic development of space solve the energy problem? In what way do 

the material resources of the solar system help to overcome the finite resources of our

world? The following sections will address these questions.

Wealth, Resources, and National Security and Spacepower Theory 

In 482 BCE, a rich vein of silver was discovered in the Athenian mines at Laurium. It 

was proposed at the time to use the profits derived from this discovery as a boon to the 

people of Athens. Themistocles, a leader of Athens who rose from the merchant class to 

power, argued for the money to be used to build a fleet to protect the city. This proposal 

was accepted, and in a development even Themistocles never foresaw, this fleet formed 

the backbone of the Greek city-state's navy that defeated the Persians at the battle of 

Salamis.21 This battle, one of the crucial East/West battles of ancient times, guaranteed 

the freedom of Greece and halted the ambition of Persia to dominate the West. 

In later centuries, it was the pattern for Rome to extract as much of the wealth as possible 

from their conquests. This wealth fueled the growth of the empire and provided the 

economic basis for its further expansion. As wealth obtained in conquest dissipated, 

Rome began its long decline. In the modern era, the Spanish emulated Rome in the 

expropriation of wealth from the New World. The Spanish wasted their wealth in wars, 

and their power waned after the destruction of their fleet in 1588 by the English. England, 

on the other hand, used the path of commerce tied to conquest leading to the empire 

"where the sun never sets." However, the exhaustion of British wealth in the two World 

Wars led to the breakup of the empire and the greatly reduced position of influence that 

England holds in the world today. 

The United States used its plentiful internal natural resources, commerce, and a 

commitment to industrialization to give our nation its first burst of power. This is turning 

to a disadvantage as those resources are depleted. If the pattern of past centuries holds, 

the power centers of the 21st century will shift to those areas where the remaining 

planetary natural resources are located, and industrial infrastructure supports the 

underpinning of military power. If we are not able to overcome the factors leading to this 

shift in wealth and industrial power, our national power is apt to become far more limited 

than it is today. 

So the fundamental question is: can the resources of the solar system enable the United 

States and the world to transcend the intrinsic limitations associated with relying only on 

what is available on the Earth? The follow-on question is: what is the implementation 

strategy that follows from an adoption of an expansionist policy based upon this 

redefinition of spacepower theory and its intimate linkage to national power theory?

The Resources of the Solar System 

In conducting a necessarily circumscribed survey of the resources of the solar system, it 

is important to understand that the level of our knowledge of these bodies is still limited, 

though far greater in quality and quantity than 40 years ago. We have landed humans on 
the Moon and returned enough material to provide ground truth tests of previous and 

future lunar remote sensing missions. However, there has been no detailed examination 

of the Moon from the standpoint of a true economic resource survey. This is also 

decidedly true for the NEO population, Mars, and the vast quantity of asteroids in the belt 

between the inner rocky planets and Jupiter. However, since the first robotic asteroid 

flyby by the Galileo probe in 1990, a tremendous amount of data has been obtained about 

the asteroids, and NASA's Mars missions continue to make daily discoveries, each one 

opening new vistas for potential resource exploitation. European, Chinese, Indian, and 

American missions have recently or will soon return to our Moon to continue 

scientifically examining our nearest celestial neighbor. In 2000, the Near Earth Asteroid 

Rendezvous mission was the first robotic spacecraft to orbit and later land on an asteroid 

(433 Eros). This mission provided a great deal of operational experience in the uneven 

gravity field of these small objects. Therefore, with the availability of these new datasets, 

we can make informed speculations regarding the resource potential of our solar system 

and from that construct plausible scenarios regarding how those resources can 

supplement and eventually supplant those thought only available on the Earth. 

A differentiation must also be made between materials obtained from various locations 

and returned to the Earth from those obtained and used in situ. As the interplanetary 

economy develops, there are materials that tend to be plentiful on the Earth, such as iron, 

that are also plentiful in space. It is doubtful whether iron will ever be an economical 

import material to the Earth but will be extremely valuable in space and on planetary 

bodies for structures, radiation shielding, and other uses. This is also true of other metals 

such as aluminum. Due to the depth of the Earth's gravity well (11.2 kilometers 

[km]/second [sec]-1 escape velocity versus lunar 2.4 km/sec-1, as little as 100 millisecond-1

from an asteroid), it will be cost-effective to utilize local resources as much as possible in 

building up an industrial infrastructure around the solar system. However, the primary 

purpose of these resources is to enable the ability to obtain valuable commodities for 

export to the Earth.

The Moon and Cislunar Space 

Material resources. Some advocates of space development have called the Moon the 

"great slag heap" of the solar system.22 This is partially due to the rocks returned by the 

Apollo astronauts that sampled an extremely small part of the lunar surface. Figure 8–1 

shows the ranges of chemical composition for the major lunar minerals in various rock 

types.23 All major minerals on the Moon are oxides of metals. Iron, magnesium, 

aluminum, silicon, and titanium make up most of the metal oxides by weight. While far 

from being a slag heap, the Moon's resources are tightly bound to oxygen, and it takes a 

significant amount of energy to separate the metals. Unlike on the Earth, oxygen itself is 

a resource on the Moon, and most lunar resource extraction concepts envision oxygen as 

the first resource product. While the majority of these metals are valuable, it is unlikely 

that they will be exported to the Earth due to the cost of fuel for their transport. The 

valuable metals on the Moon are those that have been implanted by the constant 

bombardment of asteroids over its 4.4-billion-year history.
Figure 8–1. Ranges of Chemical Compositions for Major Lunar Minerals
The author has taken the knowledge of the composition and distribution of metallic

asteroids to construct a theory that states that some fragments of these bodies survive 

impact and are available as a resource. The basis of the hypothesis is related to the 

strength of materials of a solid nickel/iron meteorite as found on the Earth, and the known 

energy of an impacting object hitting the Moon's surface. In essence, the average impact 

velocity of these bodies is insufficient to either completely destroy them or to eject the 

fragments from the Moon's gravitational field. Therefore, based on the known statistics of 

the distribution of NEOs of the nickel/iron type, we can estimate a resource base in the 

billions of tons distributed on the lunar surface. This has been at least partially verified by 

the Apollo missions.24

Figure 8–2 shows the distribution of platinum group metals (PGMs) obtained from 

meteorites that have survived Earth impact.25 Metallic fines (powdered metals) in 

quantities of 0.1–1 percent are common in Apollo-era regolith samples, indicating a 

lower bound for this resource. A possible upper bound is known on the Earth as the 

Sudbury Complex in Canada. The Sudbury mining district in Ontario province has 

produced nickel for 100 years. Over $100 billion in nickel has been produced so far at 

Sudbury, with another $100 billion still in the ground.26 PGM mines are also producing 

quantities of metals for the market. It is estimated that the total value of all metals from 

the Sudbury district is in excess of $300 billion.27 In recent years, the geophysical 

community has come to the conclusion that the Sudbury mining district is an 

"astrobleme," or a remnant of an asteroid impact approximately 1.9 billion years old.28 In 

South Africa, the famous Merensky Reef mining district is near another asteroid impact 

known as the Verdefort structure. In truth, we have always used asteroid-derived metals.

Figure 8–2. Platinum Group Metals Concentrations in Parts per Million in Select 

Terrestrial Meteorites

PGMs are crucial to our industrial civilization as the catalysts for oil refining, the critical 

element in the coatings for liquid crystal displays for our computers, as well as a vital 
component in achieving the fantastic data densities of hard drives. PGMs are also the key 

chemical element that makes proton electron membrane fuel cells work. These fuel cells 

are the "engines" for automobiles and the hydrogen economy. Without PGMs, there is no 

hydrogen economy. 

It is estimated that it will take the production of over 25 million ounces per year of PGMs 

to support just the production of fuel cells for transportation uses. Today, that production 

is only 5 million ounces.29 There are only five major regions in the world where PGMs 

are produced. South Africa has most of the reserves of PGMs, and other producers are in 

Russia, Zimbabwe, the United States, and Canada. The global reserves of PGMs may not 

be adequate to support this level of production. The United States Geological Survey 

estimates that there are approximately 48 million kilograms of PGMs in the global 

resource base, with 72 percent of that total in South Africa.30 However, the South African 

government's own estimates are less than 50 percent of that total, and they have recently 

indicated that the PGMs in the Merensky Reef are virtually exhausted.31 The limit on the 

availability of PGMs will pace the hydrogen economy just as much as the limit on the 

availability of oil restricts our options in the hydrocarbon economy today.

An article in Resource Investor from October 2006 illustrates the vulnerability of the 

United States and its allies in this area:

The platinum group metals (PGMs) are an excellent example of one such 

resource controlled today by a virtual cartel made up of private western 

companies that will never, on their own, allow the price of these metals to 

grow to the point where they cannot be used, so that demand collapses. 

The virtual platinum cartel, however, is nervous of the Russians and the 

Chinese in Africa, because supplies of new platinum group metals are 

being developed almost exclusively in Russia and Chinese-dominated 

Africa. Worse for the virtual cartel is the fact that most of the demand for 

new platinum group metals for autocatalyst, petroleum reforming catalyst 

and jewelry is coming from Russia and mainland China.32

The article also indicated that the strategy of nations such as Russia and China is not to 

challenge the United States on the battlefield, but to attack the economic foundations of 

the United States in a way that weakens our ability to field a superpower class military. 

Russian sources recently have indicated their desire for a PGM cartel similar to the one 

that existed in the interwar years of the 1920s when African production was nil and they 

controlled the market.33 This is why lunar-derived PGMs are increasingly important to 

access. This is our flanking maneuver. If we have unfettered access to off-planet PGM 

resources and can deliver them to the market at a reasonable price, then we eliminate the 

threat to the emerging hydrogen economy that such a cartel would have. 

This type of warfare on the economy is outside of the traditional military-oriented 

purview. However, this is the value of the reexamination of our spacepower theory: to 

incorporate it into a comprehensive national power theory in order to sidestep the

economic warfare that is directed at us today and that will become an increasing threat 
should we continue to rely only on the resources available on the Earth. With this 

flanking maneuver, we disarm our adversaries without having to fire a shot, while 

increasing the wealth of our nation in such a way as to continue to afford our strategic 

and tactical deterrence. 

It is a fair probability that there are vast quantities of asteroid-derived material impacted 

on the Moon. These resources are several orders of magnitude more accessible and 

immediately valuable than the proposed Helium 3 resources advocated by others. If there 

is one nickel/iron body on the Moon whose size is the equivalent of an asteroid a few 

hundred meters in diameter, then its value is easily several trillion dollars.34 Today, PGM 

prices are generally four times what they were in 2003, with platinum costing over 

$1,300 per ounce. Lunar-derived platinum, refined on the Moon, also would not 

contribute to pollution or the production of carbon dioxide, both considerations for the 

future. It is imperative for the United States to not become hostage to unfriendly states for 

our resources, and the Moon is the gateway to making that happen.

Recent computer modeling simulations support the contention of large quantities of 

PGMs on the Moon. In a paper presented at the Lunar Planetary Science Conference in 

2008, support for the resources associated with metallic impactors was studied by a group 

of the foremost researchers in planetary impacts. Their conclusions were that:

1) Numerous low velocity impacts events will be recorded on the Moon; 

2) Projectile material will be relatively unshocked, and largely contained 

within the crater; and 3) The total mass of the asteroidal material 

associated with these events is significant.35

With the above conclusions based upon solid computer modeling, experimental evidence 

should be obtainable from remote sensing that will indicate "significant asteroidal 

material." If even one such multi-billion-ton object of this type was discovered on the 

lunar surface, it would significantly change the economics of lunar development, to the 

tune of trillions of dollars worth of concentrated metals.With the number of spacecraft in 

lunar orbit at this time, such a discovery could happen any day. The question is, what 

would happen to change the strategic position of the Moon, and how would this work to 

explode the geocentric mindset?

Another metal of strategic importance to military hardware is titanium. Some areas of the 

Moon contain upward of 20 percent titanium dioxide (TiO2) in the regolith. This is a 

valuable resource in terms of the metal and oxygen for chemical propulsion systems. The 

Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) has recently invested large sums 

of money in the DARPA Titanium Initiative (DTi) to develop a process to more 

efficiently reduce TiO2 to metallic titanium.36 This process is aiming to reduce the cost of 

titanium from $13–$16 per pound to $2–$6 per pound. While this actually makes lunar 

titanium less attractive as a transportable resource, it does indicate the value that the 

Defense Department places on this metal. 
Anthony Tether, DARPA director, indicated in a 2006 interview that the reduction in 

price for titanium would result in its being used for steam piping in naval ships, which 

would reduce wear from corrosion as well as offer weight savings over stainless steel 

used today.37 It is interesting to note that 90 percent of the world's resources in titanium 

are located in Russia. The United States minimized the use of titanium in militarily 

important systems during the Cold War due to this fact. It is also worth noting that the 

process of improvement on the Earth for titanium production will also lower that cost on 

the Moon and result in more cost-effective production of oxygen, one of the key 

ingredients for liquid-fueled launch vehicles. There is tremendous value both here on the 

Earth and in space for lower cost oxygen as propellant.

Many studies have shown that lunar production of oxygen has a payback ratio as high as 

60 to 1 in improving the ability to lift mass from LEO to higher orbits. Lunar oxygen, 

derived in 1,000-ton quantities per year, could lead to dramatically lower costs for large 

spacecraft moving from LEO to GEO or any other orbits in near Earth space. Lunar 

oxygen could lead to a complete revolution in the way that military communications, 

remote sensing, and positioning systems are developed and operated. Today, most 

military LEO assets and GEO assets are limited in life due to the exhaustion of fuel. This 

places limitations on the operational use of these multibillion-dollar assets as an increased 

operational tempo results in shorter fuel life (LEO satellites primarily). What if an 

inexpensive means of refueling these assets existed? This would considerably increase 

lifetimes, reduce lifecycle costs, and provide an operationally responsive flexibility far 

beyond today's capabilities. Lunar oxygen would enable this capability with titanium and 

other metals as the side benefit. 

In developing lunar metals and oxygen, the probability of a positive feedback mechanism 

for terrestrial mining exists. It is inevitable that as we begin large-scale efforts to derive 

oxygen and metals from what is nominally base rock, we will discover ways to improve 

the processes and reduce costs. These methodologies could feed back into terrestrial 

processes to improve them as well. The problem on the Earth is the lack of concentrated 

resources rather than lack of supply, at least for the base metals. Since the dawn of 

civilization, mining on Earth has relied on the localized enhancement of valuable 

resources based on volcanism (veins of gold in quartz intrusions, for example), 

weathering (placer deposits), and other processes that do not exist on the Moon. If we 

can, through the exploitation of lunar resources, improve the processes here on Earth, we 

can continue to increase the supply of industrially important metals. This does not work 

for rare and valuable metals such as PGMs, titanium, and other strategic metals that are 

not common in the Earth's crust. This positive innovation feedback loop has been 

discussed by Robert Zubrin (author of chapter 12 in this volume) in his works on Mars as 

well.

Industrial production on the Moon and in cislunar space. Very little has been written in 

recent years concerning lunar industrial-scale production, but a lunar materials extraction 

economy inevitably leads in this direction. For example, for every metric ton of oxygen 

produced using titanium as a feedstock, 1,375 kilograms (3,025 pounds) of titanium 

result. For every metric ton of oxygen produced from an iron oxide, 2.4 tons of iron are 
produced. For every metric ton of oxygen produced from aluminum oxide (Al2O3), 923 

kilos of aluminum (2,030 pounds) result. It is likely that oxygen in multi-ton lots will be 

made to support the reduction in costs associated with NASA's "Vision for Space 

Exploration." Preliminary estimates are that 269 tons of liquid oxygen could be stored per 

year if the spent descent stages from NASA's Lunar Surface Access Module are used for 

storage, increasing by this amount per year as the spent stages build up on the lunar 

surface.38 This means that there are potentially going to be hundreds of tons of base metal 

available very quickly after NASA begins its outpost operations on the lunar surface. 

This does not include any possible resources from NEO metallic impactors. 

With all of this metal, what can be done? Many advanced manufacturing processes today 

use a vacuum to improve the quality of processed alloys. These alloys, when poured into 

sheets, beams, or other structural support material, can be made into living or 

manufacturing space on the Moon. With abundant oxygen for propellant (hydrogen 

brought from the Earth or locally derived), spacecraft could be built with physical 

parameters unlike anything made today. In 2004, one of the author's companies did a 

study for DARPA Special Projects Office for an optical system with a primary optical 

mirror diameter as large as 50 to 100 meters.39 This optical system would form the core of 

a persistent surveillance system with a ground resolution of <1 meter over an area the 

size of Iraq or Iran. This system could be built almost entirely of lunar-derived materials 

for the structure and even the mirrors using a silicon foam process developed under 

contract to the National Reconnaissance Office by Shaefer Corporation. The velocity 

change to go from the lunar surface to GEO orbit is only slightly more than departing 

from LEO (3.8 km/sec-1 versus 3.0 km/sec-1) and less than a third of the energy required 

to lift the same payload from Earth.

The U.S. Armed Forces today have far more requirements for space systems than they 

have money to fulfill them; time and time again, programs have been cancelled due to 

excessive costs. At some point, the Services will have to consider alternate means to 

satisfy the growing need for space operations capability. Many smaller missions such as 

the TacSats and the XSS–10 and 11 spacecraft have proven the rudiments of space 

operations capability. However, when DARPA took the next step with Orbital Express, 

the costs quickly spiraled out of control.40 Orbital Express proved out many of the 

technologies needed to extend the life and expand the operational capabilities of U.S. 

strategic and tactical space assets. The Department of Defense must move from high-cost 

developmental missions to a routine military/commercial model in order to achieve the 

operational cost reductions necessary for future space systems. A robust American space 

operations capability demands that we meet future threats to our assets in space and deny 

potential adversaries the use of their own systems. With the dramatic brain drain at work 

in the American aerospace industry today, we simply must look at new ways of doing 

business.

Responsive space has also become a buzzword of note in the space community. 

However, the vast majority of efforts in this area have focused on launch vehicles. We 

live at the bottom of a deep gravity well. The day is fast approaching where we will either 

aggressively adopt alternate means of obtaining responsive space access or continue to 
pour billions into a process that at its very best provides only incremental improvements 

in capability. An expansive capability to access material resources derived from the 

Moon will provide a true transformational capability to the warfighter. The top leadership 

in the Nation understands the transformational nature of the economic development of the 

solar system, and this is codified into law by Congress. The Moon and its development 

are the first jumping-off point for this effort.

Spacepower theory and the economic development of cislunar space. In the expansion of 

spacepower theory from a purely geocentric mode to a more expansive one, near Earth 

space—including the Moon and libration points (the gravitationally stable regions of the 

Earth/Moon and Earth/Sun system—is the first near-term logical extension of our 

economic sphere. In energy terms, this includes all space within the gravitational 

influence of Earth, which stretches for a radius of approximately 1 million miles from the 

center of Earth.41 A gravitational potential plot of the Lagrange points is shown in figure 

8–3. These gravitational potentials indicate stable points where spacecraft can maintain 

their position with little or no fuel expenditure relative to their position in Earth orbit. 

Today, we have several scientific spacecraft in these orbits, providing important 

information about the Sun and giving warning of dangerous solar storms that can damage 

spacecraft in Earth orbit. There are also similar Earth/Moon Lagrange points that are 

20,000 miles inside and outside of the Moon's orbit (L1 and L2).

Figure 8–3. Lagrange Points in Earth/Sun System

(Image Courtesy of Wikipedia)
Proximity is the first principal reason for an initial generation expansion of spacepower 

theory to encompass the near Earth environment. The Moon is only 3 days away for 

humans and unmanned vehicles using chemical propulsion. The lunar Lagrange points 

are at a similar distance. The Earth/Sun Lagrange points are a few months away in terms 

of time to get there, but energetically they are easier to get to than the surface of the 

Moon. As spacepower theory develops for near Earth space, we must begin to think in 

terms of time and energy as important considerations in military/civilian logistics. The 

second principal reason is related to the resources available from the surface of the Moon. 

Even if NEO resources are limited to the dispersed fines already known from the Apollo 

missions and the amount of water at the lunar poles is considerably less than forecast, the 

Moon's vast quantity of materials and the potential for permanently lit locations at the 

poles represent the new economic high ground of space. The lunar poles have the two 

critical ingredients needed for an off-planet industrial system: inexpensive energy and 

material resources in abundance.

Even though competition for these locations has not yet begun, it is inevitable. The 

nations and industries that establish themselves at the poles will gain a dramatic strategic 

advantage. In space, energy is everything, and it is only at the lunar poles (more in the 

north than the south) that the Sun shines through most if not all of its monthly rotation. 

This allows inexpensive solar power to be used rather than relying on expensive nuclear 

power. A solar power system can be implemented on an incremental basis, and some 

researchers have devised ways to actually make solar cells on the Moon, providing a 
bootstrap approach to power levels all the way to the gigawatt level.42 Having abundant 

energy available from the Sun aids in developing the lunar industrial infrastructure, 

considering that the biggest users of energy will certainly be the oxygen and metals 

production industries.43

As the emplaced power grows, so does production capacity in direct proportion. Large 

enclosed structures can be built for living space, food production, and advanced 

manufacturing, both in the extreme lunar vacuum and within an atmosphere. With even a 

modest production rate of tons per month, new systems, both manned and unmanned, can 

be constructed that are as far beyond the Apollo or current NASA plans as the 747 is 

beyond the Wright Flyer. Building a system that launches from a surface in vacuum 

eliminates the current constraints of the pencil-shaped launch vehicles and their fairings. 

The low energy for transit enables the construction of large GEO structures for many 

purposes, which will help to preserve the ability to use that orbit and lessen the need for 

formation flying systems in today's crowded equatorial orbit. 

The advantages of the Moon only begin with the examples given in the previous sections. 

With lunar manufacturing and propellant production enabled by plentiful energy, we can 

build spacecraft that can travel to NEOs such as 2004 GU9, a small body that is actually 

gravitationally bound to Earth at this time. With advanced spacecraft and with 

operational experience gained in near Earth space, it becomes relatively easy to reach 

resources far in excess of what is available on the Moon.

The skeptic at this point would insist that the cost/benefit ratio for going to the Moon and 

extracting resources will never have a positive payback. That is because most previous 

efforts described the resources in geocentric terms, whereby only raw materials and 

possibly energy were beamed back to Earth. This limited perspective was developed by 

previous generations of space advocates who envisioned beaming power back to Earth or 

bringing the raw materials back to Earth or LEO for processing. By expanding our 

perspective to building a bootstrapping industrial infrastructure, it becomes possible to 

build up the robust operational capabilities that would be needed to lower the cost of 

transportation within all near Earth space. With reusable space-based systems, the cost of 

transportation can decline to the marginal cost of fuel plus profits. This leads to an actual 

cislunar economy where advanced high-tech materials flow from Earth to the Moon, and 

industrial production and high-value resources such as PGMs flow back to Earth, which 

benefits with new GEO platforms for telecommunications, remote sensing, and other 

applications not possible with individual spacecraft launched from Earth. The sky is no 

longer the limit, and this is just the beginning.

It is the GEO applications that will drive private enterprise in the development of cislunar 

space. Private enterprise in space today is a conservative enterprise with well-defined 

parameters related to risk mitigation, profitability, and technology implementation. 

Commercial GEO assets have advanced technologically in a very incremental way, and 

this is not likely to change in the near term. However, some proponents (including this 

author) advocate that by using existing space assets such as the International Space 

Station as a base to construct commercial GEO platforms, the first steps can be taken 
toward shifting the technological implementation rate in a profitable manner. 

Unfortunately, at least in the near term the Moon will not be a bastion of private 

enterprise without a parallel government effort that goes beyond the minimalist efforts 

that characterize the current NASA plans. This is where a wider spacepower theory 

development can play a critical role in informing leaders across the government of the 

economic development potential of cislunar space. Today, the United States has the 

technological and financial wherewithal to execute on the ideas set forth herein. It is a 

matter of will if we do so. The risk is low, and the results will continue to benefit the 

Nation for possibly hundreds of years. 

The Resources of the Near Earth Asteroids 

There are no technological showstoppers preventing the United States from aggressively 

moving into the solar system to exploit its economic potential. The great thing about this 

move is that there is enough for everyone. With the Moon as the first link in a chain of 

economic development, we next step out to the NEOs. 

In his book Mining the Sky, John Lewis of the University of Arizona developed some 

amazing statistics concerning NEOs. The sizes and numbers of asteroids whose orbit 

either crosses the Earth's orbit or comes between the Earth and Mars are as follows: 1

kilometer or larger, 1,000 to 2,000 objects;100 meters or larger, 500,000 objects; 10 

meters or larger, 100,000,000 objects.44 A 10-meter asteroid, weighing about 100,000 

tons, hitting the Earth at an average speed of 20 kilometers per second, has an equivalent 

nuclear yield of 100 kilotons, or 5 times larger than the devices used at Hiroshima and 

Nagasaki. It is known by the study of meteorites that approximately 3 to 4 percent of the 

NEO bodies are nickel, iron, cobalt, and small quantities of PGMs. On top of this, about 

5 percent of these bodies are known to be carbonaceous chondrites (CC), with up to 20 

percent water in hydrated minerals, carbon, nitrogen, oxygen, and even greater fractional 

quantities of PGMs than the metallic asteroids. This means that there are significant 

economically valuable resources available on bodies that energetically are as easy, if not 

easier, to land on than the Moon. Additionally, it is strongly suspected that the inner 

moon of Mars—Phobos—and possibly the outer moon, Deimos, are CC bodies. The 

water in these bodies can be obtained by placing the hydrated minerals in an enclosed 

vessel and simply heating to 400° C.

Here is a scenario related to a metallic and CC body. First of all, it is entirely possible 

that a kilometer class metallic asteroid has impacted the Moon and remained at least 

somewhat intact. The smallest positively identified metal asteroid is the 2-kilometer sized 

3554 Amun asteroid, estimated by Lewis to be worth between $20 trillion and $30 trillion 

in metals.45 The largest metal asteroid known is 216 Kleopatra. This body is a dumbbellshaped object approximately 217 by 94 by 81 kilometers.46 This is a main belt asteroid, 

more difficult to get to than 3554 Amun, but a very cursory estimate of the value of this 

asteroid is 1 billion times the $30 trillion value of 3554 Amun. There are tens of 

thousands of these metallic asteroids that are easier to get to energetically than the orbit 

of Mars. There is little danger of asteroidal metals cartels controlling the distribution of 
these resources. If there is an intact body of this size class on the Moon, then there is 

instantly a resource of PGMs greater than the aggregate global reserves of these metals.

The second scenario is the discovery of water on Phobos and Deimos, the moons of 

Mars. Phobos is ~22 kilometers in diameter, and Deimos is ~12 kilometers in diameter. If 

one or both of these bodies are CC type asteroids, a mission could be sent there for less 

energy than it takes to land on the Moon. These bodies literally could become gas stations 

as the estimated potential amount of water on Phobos could be in excess of 100 billion 

tons.Couple this with the possibility of water on the Moon (estimated at between 100 

million to 1 billion tons), and the fuel becomes available to move around in the inner 

solar system. Add to this the hundreds of billions of tons of water available as hydrated 

minerals on NEOs, and there is virtually an unlimited supply of fuel for operations in the 

inner and mid solar system.

Mars

Although this presentation does not discuss the promise of Mars, the author does see it as 

an intrinsic part of the overall plan for the solar system and agrees with Zubrin that Mars 

has all the necessary resources to become a second permanent outpost for humanity. 

Coupled with the rich resources of the asteroids, the Moon, and energy available in free 

space, the author feels confident in the future of a prosperous humanity. One counterpoint 

to Zubrin is that we must begin with a less onerous target than Mars. While Mars has 

material resources far in excess of the Moon, the distance and the problem of a lack of 

plentiful energy without nuclear power indicate that gaining operational experience in the 

backyard of cislunar space brings enough benefits to the development of Mars that it is 

worth the time it takes to do so.

Energy 

Far more than resources, energy is the Achilles' heel of modern society. The exploitation 

of the resources of the solar system addresses this issue through indirect methods. 

Lunar Power 

A chapter in this volume advocates the emplacement on the Moon of 1 gigawatt of 

electrical power by the year 2030. This is difficult but achievable if the will of the 

government is coupled with appropriate economic incentives to private enterprise. This 

power would be used locally on the Moon to drive economic development to produce 

propellants and metals for lunar industrialization. Plentiful energy is the key on the Moon

as on Earth. With this level of power, the United States would have an incredible 

operational capability to support the development by private enterprise of manufacturing 

infrastructure that could be used to support any level of space activity desired by the U.S. 

national security enterprise.

Fusion 
Harrison Schmidt makes a convincing argument concerning the energy content of 

helium-3 (He3), which is known to be available in diffuse quantities on the Moon.47 Many 

obstacles must be overcome to be able to utilize He3, but the investment in fusion power 

is the world's ultimate liberator from enslavement to hydrocarbon energy. Practical fusion 

systems are under development today with the 2006 signing of the ITER Agreement, an 

international fusion energy agreement. The United States should dramatically increase its 

commitment to include building its own research reactors on the Moon. Its vacuum 

removes a major impediment in the operation of a fusion reactor. 

The hydrogen economy stands or falls not only on the availability of PGMs but also on 

the production of vast quantities of electrical energy to split water into hydrogen and 

oxygen. Fusion does this in a carbon neutral way, and a He3 reactor will ultimately be the 

radiation byproduct–free way of generating this power. Eventually, this He3 could be 

obtained from the atmospheres of the outer planets, where it is billions of times more 

plentiful than on the Moon. But again, this treads a path well into our future. Both He3

and its acquisition at the outer planets are entirely possible by the latter decades of the 

21st century.

Conclusion 

This chapter has sought to stimulate a change in mindset in the development of a 

coherent 21st-century spacepower theory. Beginning with the dramatic restatement of 

American goals by OSTP director Marburger to economically develop the solar system, 

this chapter proposes that this become a core value of a future American spacepower 

theory. The struggle for global control of energy and planetary resources is actively under 

way today. At this time, the U.S. Armed Forces are ill prepared, both psychologically and 

materially, to actively influence these events within the context of current power theory, 

which are in the realms normally reserved for civilian leadership. It is proposed that 

spacepower theory build upon the theme of economic development of the solar system 

and a wide ranging operational capability to operate in inner solar system space. The 

resources available from the Moon are a beginning step in this process. Near Earth

objects represent an incredible boost to our nation's wealth, helping us sidestep issues of 

direct conflict with potential adversaries. 

The cost of this economic expansion into space is not cheap. However, it is not more 

expensive than the current operational tempo in the Middle East or the recent economic 

stimulus spending. The United States is entering an era more dangerous than any it has 

ever faced, and it is incumbent upon the engineers and scientists who build space 

hardware to provide decisionmakers proper advice on what can and cannot be done in 

this arena. NASA in the 1960s went to the Moon when it was virtually impossible to do 

so except for with the mobilized resources of an entire nation. Today, this can be done 

with a mixture of policy decisions, limited financial support, and the enablement of 

private enterprise. With the Moon as a beginning, the economic development of the entire 

solar system becomes possible and mankind will be freed from the cradle of our birth. All 

that is necessary to begin this process today is the realization by decisionmakers that this 

can be done.
Recommendations 

This change can begin with the resources already in place today or expenditures that are 

already within the planning of the Armed Forces and NASA. Following are some 

recommendations on things that can be done now, with no more risk than the current 

operating environment for space. 

Tax policy. A bill to remove the levying of Federal taxes for profits made in off-planet 

activities (not including existing communications and remote sensing satellites) with a 

holiday of not less than 20 years would help provide incentive for private investment in 

space. This bill, called the Zero G Zero Tax Bill, passed the House and was defeated by a 

few votes in the Senate in the year 2000. This bill should be passed.

Transponder bandwidth long-term purchase. The Armed Forces and Congress have 

resisted this approach as it reduces flexibility in expenditures and scheduling. However, 

the Leased Satellite program of the 1980s provided significant capabilities to the Armed 

Forces without having to pay for development costs. The profit motive allowed the 

contractors to utilize maximally efficient development techniques for spacecraft in order 

to obtain a profit for the deal. This model or something similar should be implemented in 

order to offer incentive to commercial U.S. providers only. If the issue is concern over 

survivability under attack, simply levy appropriate requirements on the commercial 

provider and provide cash incentives in the transponder lease to cover the costs.

Asteroid search. The Armed Forces through the LINEAR program already have a NEO 

detection network in place. Follow this up with instruments capable of spectrophotometry 

of these bodies in order to increase the confidence of mission planners in the potential 

resources of these bodies. This program has been highly successful in locating these 

objects, and spectrographic follow-up will be similarly useful to the astronomical 

community.

Operationally responsive space. Much is written about this area of military operations, 

albeit with a geocentric approach. Expand the parameters of the definition of 

operationally responsive systems to include on-orbit servicing of existing assets. Also, 

expand the definition to include propellant depots, the on-orbit assembly of spacecraft, 

and the ability to navigate ubiquitously in cislunar space. 

Advanced studies. As a beginning, provide funding through DARPA for advanced (above 

seedling level) studies on the uses of lunar derived materials to construct persistent 

surveillance systems in GEO and other orbits. Also, provide funding similar to the 

titanium initiative for the reduction in cost to provide lunar oxygen, metals, and 

manufacturing infrastructure to support large GEO platforms for communications and 

other operational needs.

Practical Effects of a Solar System–encompassing Spacepower Theory
Conflict will not end with expansion into the solar system. There will always be reasons 

for conflicts, but one of the major ones throughout history, the acquisition of resources, 

will change focus. The strategic focus will change to acquiring the most easily accessible 

resources off planet rather than a scramble for the remaining resources here on Earth. It is 

speculated that a psychological shift in the populace of the world will take place that will 

lessen the causes for conflict here. If it is seen that there are resources beyond those of 

just our one planet, then much of the strategic posturing that is in active process today by 

China, India, countries in the Middle East, and Russia will be rendered moot, as it is 

based on securing a dwindling terrestrial resource base.48

The biggest problem that confronts the United States today is that many who would read 

this simply refuse to believe that what is laid out in this chapter is feasible. From those of 

us who have given our lives to the development of space, we assure you that all of this is 

possible and indeed necessary if we are to transcend the physical resource limitations that 

confront our civilization today. Problems such as climate change cannot be solved simply 

by conservation and alternative energy. We need to create a planetary civilization that 

provides opportunity for all of our world's citizens to have a better life than our ancestors 

and provide our children with the same beneficial society that we enjoy today. With the 

resources of space, this becomes possible. Without them, we are on a course toward 

conflict far worse than the skirmishes that have defined the last 30 years of history. We 

have a choice before us, and the results of the choice made by our generation will last for 

a very long time. Ideas are the currency of hope, and the idea of an expansive economic 

development of the solar system is a necessary step in educating our political leaders and 

our people of the hope that is out there for us to grasp. 

Notes

1. John Marburger, keynote address, 44th Robert H. Goddard Memorial Symposium, Greenbelt, MD, 

March 15, 2006, available at <www.spaceref.com/news/viewsr.html?pid=19999>.

2. U.S. Census Bureau, "Total Midyear Population for the World, 1950–2050," available at 

<www.census.gov/ipc/www/idb/worldpop.html>. 

3. James L. Hyatt III et al., Space Power 2010, Research Report 95–05 (Maxwell Air Force Base, 

AL: Air Command and Staff College, May 1995), 5.

4. "Project Horizon Report: A U.S. Army Study for the Establishment of a Lunar Outpost," June 9, 

1959, available at <www.astronautix.com/articles/prorizon.htm>.

5. Walter McDougall, . . . . The Heavens and the Earth: A Political History of the Space Age

(Baltimore: The Johns Hopkins University Press, 1985), 339.

6. "The Clementine Mission," available at <www.cmf.nrl.navy.mil/clementine/>.

7. NASA Ames Research Center, "The NASA/USAF NEO Search Program," available at 

<http://impact.arc.nasa.gov/news_detail.cfm?ID=22>.

8. Michael B. Duke, Wendell W. Mendell, and Barney B. Roberts, "Strategies for a Permanent Lunar 

Base," in Lunar Bases and Space Activities in the 21st Century, ed. W.W. Mendell (Houston: 

Lunar and Planetary Institute Press, 1986), available at <http://articles.adsabs.harvard.edu/cgibin/nph-iarticle_query?bibcode=1985lbsa.conf...57D>.

9. Marburger. 

10. McDougall, 315.
11. "Treaty on Principles Governing the Activities of States in the Exploration and Use of Outer 

Space, Including the Moon and Other Celestial Bodies," January 27, 1967, available at 

<www.state.gov/t/ac/trt/5181.htm>. 

12. World Wildlife Fund, Living Planet Report 2006, available at 

<http://assets.panda.org/downloads/living_planet_report.pdf>.

13. Thomas R. Malthus, An Essay on the Principle of Population (London: J. Johnson, 1798).

14. Chip Cummins, "As Threats to Oil Supply Grow, A General Says U.S. Isn't Ready," The Wall 

Street Journal, December 19, 2006, A1. 

15. Thomas Pickens, "T. Boone's Latest Oil Forecast," available at <www.boonepickens.com/oilforecast.asp>. 

16. Matthew Simmons, Twilight in the Desert: The Coming Saudi Oil Shock and the World Economy 

(New York: John Wiley and Sons, Inc., 2005). 

17. "Securing America's Future Energy," available at <www.secureenergy.org/shockwave_facts.php>.

18. "Shell Cedes Control of Pivotal Russian Oil Project," The Wall Street Journal, December 22, 

2006.

19. "Venezuela Distributes Russian Arms to Military, Intends More Purchases," June 16, 2006, 

available at <www.venezuelanalysis.com/news.php?newsno=1988.>

20. Accessed at <www.washtimes.com/business/20070212-101701-7899r.htm>. 

21. Cyril E. Robinson, A History of Greece (London: Methuen Educational, 1929), 111.

22. Steven Wintergerst, "Lunar Laws," December 24, 2004, available at 

<www.redcolony.com/art.php?id=0412240>.

23. Michael B. Duke, Mary Fae McKay, and David S. McKay, Space Resources, vol. III, Materials

(Houston: NASA Johnson Space Center, 1992), 29.

24. Dennis R. Wingo, Moonrush: Improving Life on Earth with the Moon's Resources (Ontario: 

Collector's Guide Publishing, Inc., 2004), 104.

25. Michael I. Petaev and Steven D. Jacobson, "Differentiation of Metal-rich Meteoritic Parent 

Bodies; I. Measurements of PGEs, Re, Mo, W, and Au in Meteoric Fe-Ni Metal," Meteorics & 

Planetary Science 39, no. 10 (October 2004), 1685–1697.

26. John W. Lydon and Alan Reed, "Mineral Deposits of Canada: Canada's Historical Mining 

Production from Major Geological Types of Mineral Deposits," available at 

<http://gsc.nrcan.gc.ca/mindep/hist/index_e.php>.

27. Wingo, 94.

28. Dennis R. Wingo, "Asteroidal Resources and the Cis-lunar Industrial Economy," in Return to the 

Moon, ed. Rick N. Tumlinson and Erin Medlicott (Ontario: Collector's Guide Publishing, Inc., 

2005), 162.

29. AEA Technology, "Platinum and Hydrogen for Fuel Cell Vehicles," report for the United 

Kingdom Department for Transport, 2002, 10.

30. David R. Wilburn and Donald I. Bliewas, "Platinum Group Metals&#mdash;World Supply and 

Demand," U.S. Geological Survey Open-File Report 2004–1224, available at 

<http://pubs.usgs.gov/of/2004/1224/>.

31. Wingo, Moonrush, 84.

32. Jack Lifton, "Resource Nationalism: The Most Important Political Movement of the 21st Century," 

October 26, 2006, available at <www.resourceinvestor.com/pebble.asp?relid=25131>. 

33. "Johnson Matthey Inc.," Hoover's Profile, available at <www.answers.com/topic/johnsonmatthey?cat=biz-fin>.

34. John S. Lewis, Mining the Sky (New York: Helix Books, 1996), 112.

35. P.A. Bland, N.A. Aremieva, G.S. Collins et al., "Asteroids on the Moon: Projectile Survival 

During Low Velocity Impact," LPSC 2045.pdf, Lunar and Planetary Science Conference, 

Houston, TX, 2008.

36. Accessed at <www.darpa.mil/dso/thrust/matdev/titanium.htm>.

37. Glenn W. Goodman, "On the Record: Interview with Dr. Anthony J. Tether, DARPA Director,"

Defense Technology International (November-December 2006), 41.

38. Dennis R. Wingo, "Lunar Outpost Development and the Role of Mechanical Systems for Payload 

Handling," contractor report for NASA Langley, January 2007.

39. Dennis R. Wingo et al., "Extremely Large Optical Telescope (ELOT) Final Report," DARPA 

Special Projects Office, 2004.
40. Jeremy Singer, "Cost Overruns Threaten DARPA Orbital Express Experiment," Space News, 

March 15, 2004, available at <www.space.com/spacenews/businessmonday_040315.html>.

41. "Lagrangian point," Wikipedia, available at <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lagrangian_point#L1>.

42. Alexandre Freundlich, Alex Ignatiev, Charles Horton, Michael Duke, Peter Curren, and Laurent 

Sibille, "Manufacture of Solar Cells on the Moon," Conference Record of the Thirty-first IEEE 

Photovoltaic Specialists Conference, January 3–7, 2005, 794–797.

43. For instance, this author has created designs for NASA to emplace up to 100 kilowatts of solar 

power on a single Atlas V launched payload. 

44. Lewis, 53.

45. Ibid., 112.

46. Steven J. Ostro,>R. Scott Hudson, Michael C. Nolan, Jean-Luc Margot, Daniel J. Scheeres, 

Donald B. Campbell,Christopher Magri, Jon D. Giorgini, and Donald K. Yeomans,"Radar 

Observations of Asteroid 216 Kleopatra," Science 288, no. 5467 (May 5, 2000), 836–839. 

47. Harrison H. Schmidt, Return to the Moon: Exploration, Enterprise, and Energy in the Human 

Settlement of Space (New York: Copernicus Books, 2006).

48. Lifton. 
Chapter 9:

The Long-term Outlook for Commercial Space

Ivan Bekey

The Nation's space programs are in a horrible mess and appear to be locked in a 

downward spiral. Almost all defense and civil government space programs suffer from 

similar symptoms:

• no toleration of or planning for failures 

• avoidance of risk

• lack of funding for new technologies

• inability of industry to afford research or to develop technologies alone

• suppression of disruptive technologies 

• disappearance of the concept of experimental systems in space. 

As a result of these symptoms, the following conditions are now the norm:

• absence of innovation

• long timelines for even modestly new developments

• billion-dollar price tags for major systems

• major overruns and schedule slips 

• need for long on-orbit life to amortize the investment

• obsolescence of systems upon launch or soon thereafter.

Although these symptoms and conditions have been deliberately overstated for emphasis, 

they are more true than not. The question is then: Is there any way out of this morass? 

After all, countless committees have grappled with this situation and proposed courses of 

action, but apparently to not very much effect. In fact, the problem really has no solution 

as long as the U.S. Government remains the principal customer for space systems for 

several reasons: the government suffers from chronic risk aversion, it avoids new 

technologies and concepts, it has deep pockets of tax money and protests otherwise, there 

are few real incentives to save major amounts of money, new space systems are 

overloaded with requirements that guarantee that they overrun budgets and timelines and 

underperform, and the requirements process is broken so that even if requirements 

initially are contained, they inexorably will rise during a program and lead to major cost 

and schedule growth.

The only escape from this situation is to use market forces to bring costs down and spur 

innovation. This typically is how commercial systems live. However, a large market 

requires that products and services be relevant to large numbers of people. It requires 

risk-taking and a willingness to fail often. It requires many actors in competition, which 

means commercial approaches to space products and services.
The government's role must be to take most of the risk out of new technologies, which 

the private sector cannot now afford to do. Furthermore, the government must avoid 

competing with the private sector (we should imitate Japan, where the government and 

industry are partners in fostering national growth, whereas in the United States they are 

more adversaries than partners). In short, the Nation's space programs must mimic how 

commercial systems in general have always worked and how commercial space systems 

in particular must work.

New Technologies as Drivers 

In the next few decades, an explosion of new technologies will transform space systems, 

including commercial ones, in every way. While it is impossible to forecast what 

technologies and systems will appear, there are a number of currently identified, though 

not yet fully developed, technologies that will enable a great number of advances to be 

made in the space field. Some purveyors of current techniques and systems view many of 

these technologies with suspicion because they have seen past technology development 

efforts take longer and be much more difficult than anticipated, and they then project 

these real-life experiences, rightly or wrongly, onto all future technology proposals. 

Others are heavily invested in current technologies and are threatened by the promises of 

newer ones, consciously or unconsciously. And other purveyors are skeptical of the new 

technologies because they lack the proper science grounding or fail to understand the 

technologies' principles of operation.

Many people will label the technologies discussed in this chapter, and therefore the space 

capabilities that they will enable, as somewhere between too optimistic and bordering on 

science fiction. I would like to offer two perspectives as defense against these criticisms. 

The first is from Arthur C. Clarke: "Any sufficiently advanced technology is 

indistinguishable from magic." The second perspective is from Niccolo Machiavelli's The 

Prince: "Those who advocate a new order of things have a very difficult journey, for they 

have as enemies those who would lose by the introduction of the new, and yet only 

lukewarm supporters in those who would gain thereby."

The only credible way to make the case that the technologies that will be presented are 

not too risky or optimistic is to examine the capabilities and technologies that existed 50 

years ago and compare them with today's technologies that are accepted as commonplace 

(see figure 9–1). 

Figure 9–1. 50-year Technological Perspective
A projection 50 or even 25 years into the future will fall short because we may 

underestimate the pace of exponentiating technological development and we cannot 

forecast new inventions. As a result, it is proposed that the technologies about to be 

discussed are a reasonable set to expect to see developed in the future, possibly much 

sooner than 50 years because of the accelerating pace of technology. Rather than offering 

too optimistic a vision of the future, these technologies probably present, if anything, too 

conservative and myopic a view. Some thoughts on the likely steps, time, and effort that 

will be required to bring these technologies to maturity, with the understanding that such 

an effort is fraught with uncertainty, are offered later in the chapter.

Some of the technologies with maximum leverage, presented in random order, include:

• carbon nanotube composites and pure grown structures and devices

• nano-engineered carbon nanotube electronics, detectors, solar arrays, components, 

heat pipes and radiators, and multifunctional devices

• high specific impulse (Isp), high thrust micromachined field emission electric 

propulsion thrusters

• space tethers and tether arrays

• large adaptive membrane optics and antennas (to replace precision structures with 

information)

• ultra-efficient and lightweight quantum dot/nanostructured solar power arrays
• formation-flown autonomously cooperating swarms of silicon satellites

• adaptive, semi-autonomous, modular, self-assembling systems.

These and other new technologies will revolutionize space system applications. These 

applications will transform defense and civil space programs but will also enable 

commercial programs in the process. The result will be a space future that is very 

different from today's practices and will include:

• huge apertures for sensing anything from geostationary orbit (GEO)

• enormous and inexpensive power available anywhere in space or on ground

• lightweight yet large spacecraft that have little or no structure

• inflatable and membrane-based habitation and utility space modules 

• semi-autonomous, adaptive, reconfigurable space systems

• routine in-orbit servicing and upgrading on schedule or on demand

• true mass production of picosats with radically lowered spacecraft costs 

• acceptance of failures of experimental and new technology space systems

• dramatically reduced costs of all spacecraft

• access to space that is commonplace and comparatively "free."

While each of the above and other technologies will have a major effect, the carbon 

nanotubes or buckytubes will have the greatest effect and will result in access to space at 

costs so low as to seem free relative to today's launch costs of about $20,000 per 

kilogram. 

Carbon nanotubes are a new form of matter discovered just over a decade ago. They are 

perfect molecular structures of carbon atoms, forming carbon-carbon atomic bonds into 

hollow cylinders; they are true carbon polymers. This material is the strongest and stiffest 

one possible in this universe, as the carbon-carbon double valent bond is the strongest 

known. Carbon nanotubes have a strength-to-weight ratio 600 times greater than highstrength steel or aluminum alloys. The material is very flexible and tough; it can elongate 

20 to 30 percent and yet rebound with no damage. Likewise, it is tolerant of buckling on 

compression and can recover with no damage. It conducts heat three times better than 

pure diamond, has an electrical conductivity like copper, and can be grown to be a metal 

or a semiconductor. It is the most thermally stable of all polymers, has the highest 

possible accessible surface area of any material, and will not rust or corrode to over 900° 

F. The phenomenal strength-to-weight ratio and toughness of carbon nanotubes is 

illustrated in figure 9–2.

Figure 9–2. Ultimate Toughness of Spacecraft Materials
These materials will revolutionize spacecraft (as well as practically all ground and air 

uses), but as in most things, change will come incrementally—with initial forms being 

composites whose matrix is laced with carbon nanotubes, spun textiles of carbon 

nanotubes in randomized orientations—and only eventually reaching the holy grail: the 

growing of net-shaped, pure, single-wall carbon nanotubes with wall-wall tube contact 

and with all tubes in a parallel or desired orientation (see figure 9–3). 

Figure 9–3. Likely Development of Carbon Nanotube Material
While recognizing that progress will be incremental, we will focus on the ultimate impact 

of the pure grown single-wall carbon nanotubes. Typically, people focus on spacecraft 

structures and conclude that carbon nanotubes will at most reduce the weight of a 

spacecraft by 15 percent, the fraction of an average spacecraft that the structure 

represents. But this is in error, since in the timeframe of interest, practically all 

components and devices of spacecraft will be able to be grown with carbon nanotubes. 

This includes tankage, plumbing, engines, electronics, solar arrays, actuators, batteries, 

momentum wheels, antennas, sensors and their apertures, and on and on. It is therefore 

likely that practically all of the components of a spacecraft can be made of carbon 

nanotubes. The actual weight reduction of a component upon substituting carbon 

nanotubes for today's materials depends on how the component is loaded. Materials 

experiencing mostly tension will see a weight reduction of a factor of 600 compared to 

steel or aluminum alloys, while those in bending or compression will see the square root 

of 600, or 25. However, if we consider the actual fraction of a typical spacecraft that is 

employed by each subsystem and the weight reduction potential in that use, the typical 

entire spacecraft will see about a factor of 20 weight reduction. 

Similarly, if all the components as well as all structure elements of a typical launch 

vehicle were made from carbon nanotubes, its dry weight would be reduced by a factor of 

over 50, but its effect on the lift capability of the launch vehicle would be a factor of 7 

(see figure 9–4). 
Figure 9–4. Impact of Carbon Nanotubes on Spacecraft and Launch Vehicles

The implications are clear from the figure: the net effect of reducing spacecraft weight by 

a factor of 20 without sacrifice of function, and the increase of launch vehicle capability 

by a factor of 7 for the same size, together result in a factor of up to 140 in reduction of 

the costs of fielding a space system, solely due to the introduction of pure oriented carbon 

nanotubes. While it remains to be proven in practice, this weight reduction for the same 

capability—or, conversely, the capability increase for the same weight—should translate 

directly into a factor of up to 140 in cost for the same capability. 

Amazingly, it does not stop there. The technology of launch vehicles will result in 

roughly one order of magnitude decrease of launch costs every decade or so independent 

of the introduction of carbon nanotubes (see figure 9–5). This is not a pipe dream but 

rather is based on many studies performed over the years by the National Aeronautics and 

Space Administration (NASA) that have shown such price reductions; however, the time 

period in which these steps are likely to be attained is based only on what could be done 

if the will and budgets existed. The early steps are likely to occur later; however, when 

carbon nanotubes are introduced, it is likely that the later steps will occur sooner and 

prompt even more dramatic cost reductions than shown in the figure. The last step shown 

in figure 9–5 is the widely publicized space elevator, a concept long postulated that could 

be made feasible by carbon nanotube materials but that would be totally impractical 

because every satellite currently in orbit or that will ever be launched into orbit would 
eventually collide with it and destroy it. No reasonable, effective countermeasures have 

yet been identified, so the space elevator is unlikely to materialize.

Figure 9–5. Potential Future of Launch into Space

The net result of the foregoing is that the costs of access to space a few decades from now 

will be comparable to those of airborne systems and will be so low that, compared to the 

costs of current vehicles, launch into space will be relatively inexpensive. This will bring 

the costs of space programs into an attainable range for a large number of commercial 

entities, which will begin to develop and field their own space systems to offer products

and services in the marketplace. The entry of commercial enterprises will be the key to 

breaking the downward spiral of the Nation's space program. In fact, it will enable a 

second industrial revolution, but this time in space. 

The Space Industrial Revolution 

The revolution that will be enabled by finally bringing space fielding and operations costs 

in line with all other operations costs in the air or on the ground will unleash a plethora of 

services that have been studied and discussed over the years but that have not been taken 

seriously due to high costs of doing business in space.

Some of the commercial space programs that could take off include evolution of 

conventional services, including communications, navigation, tracking and location, and 
remote sensing. However, a host of new products and services will emerge, some robotic 

and others manned. The robotic services will include:

• global Federal Express–like delivery services 

• provision of commodities from extraterrestrial sources

• provision of light from space for night illumination and crop growth

• power distribution via space relays

• power delivery from space

• power distribution utilities in space

• contracted provision and support of some "defense" functions.

The manned services will include:

• public travel to suborbital space

• rapid public travel through space from point to point

• public travel to space hotels and resorts

• space business parks

• space sports pavilions

• space movie studios

• support for NASA human exploration

• commercial lunar and asteroid mining

• operation of space infrastructure.

Potential Commercial Space Programs 

A few of the most likely commercial space programs that could emerge in the 2010 to 

2040 time period will be described here.

Public space travel (space tourism). Public space travel has been on the forefront of the 

commercial drive into space for decades, only awaiting reliable and less expensive space 

transportation to materialize. 

Suborbital space travel—that is, climbing to an altitude of at least 100 kilometers—

officially qualifies the traveler as an astronaut by international agreement. The drive into 

suborbital space was greatly aided by the X-prize competition, won in 2004 by Burt 

Rutan's SpaceShipOne and his pilot. Other candidates are still trying to get off their 

flights, including other air-launched first stage configurations. There is a healthy but 

relatively small market forecast for suborbital flights, since they entail at most a few 

minutes of weightlessness, even though they are much less risky than orbital flights. 

Nonetheless, Virgin Galactic, the company formed to commercialize the SpaceShipOne 

concept, has several hundred reservations.

Surveys done in the last decade suggest that orbital flights are needed for a large market 

to develop. The surveys predict that 100,000 people annually would like to go into space 

at a $100,000 ticket price, and 1,000,000 would go annually at a $10,000–$20,000 ticket 

price. Public space travel (space tourism) has already started with a few wealthy tourists 
going to the International Space Station (ISS). While suborbital travel has yet to occur, 

commercial suborbital flights are planned (Rutan/Virgin Galactic). Initially, tourists will 

stay in the transportation vehicles, as they must for suborbital travel, but they will also do 

so in the initial orbital trips. If public space travel is to develop as hoped for, orbital 

hotels will be needed. This would represent a new business for the travel industry with a 

forecast market well over $30 billion annually. Hilton, Sheraton, and others are beginning 

to consider such ventures; however, entrepreneur Robert Bigelow has funded and flown, 

at his own expense, a test inflatable habitat (Genesis) and fully intends to develop and 

orbit space hotels.

Once demonstrated to be safe, the necessary inexpensive orbital vehicles will inevitably 

follow, starting with initially expendable vehicles adapted from evolved expendable 

launch vehicles (EELVs), and eventually transforming into fully reusable vehicles 

(Kistler two-stage-to-orbit, single-stage-to-orbit [SSTO]), which will offer greatly 

reduced launch costs and increased reliabilities.

These small steps are very encouraging and promise to make real the large business 

potential in public space travel. By the end of the 2030s, there could well be dozens of 

space hotels serviced by routine flights to them for tourist stays of a week or more. While 

the hoped-for cruise-ship–like space resorts will eventually become real, they will 

probably take longer to materialize. However, excursions around the Moon are also 

planned by Bigelow, and extravehicular activities are already being planned.

Space business parks. The advent of cheap and reliable space transportation, in addition 

to heralding ubiquitous public space travel, will also enable privately developed and 

operated space business parks—mixed-use facilities in orbit dedicated to supporting a 

number of different businesses with common infrastructure. 

These business parks will be privately developed, owned, and operated. They will 

comprise leasable facilities for long- or short-term occupancy by a variety of business 

tenants, which could include laboratories for pharmaceutical research or production and 

real estate for sports, movies, and other business activities. These tenants will be supplied 

by common supporting infrastructure by the park operator, including:

• staterooms with private bath

• common viewing and relaxation areas

• power and thermal facilities

• kitchen and commissary

• air locks and docking ports

• service and logistics support

• instrumentation, experiments support

• communications to/from ground

• frequent or on-demand transportation

• emergency equipment and vehicles.

An artist's concept of such a facility is illustrated in figure 9–6.
Figure 9–6. Space Business Park Concept

Power delivery to International Space Station. Support to the ISS could well be an early 

commercial service. Indeed, current NASA programs are competing commercial 

provision of logistics to the ISS from the ground, though no commitment has been made 

yet for their use.

The ISS has a number of characteristics that may make it a good candidate for 

commercial support. One such is the provision of power to the science and other users 

aboard the ISS, which is very limited. The ISS itself has little dedicated experimentation 

space, is very expensive to operate (costing about $1 million per person per day), is very 
sensitive to vibration (to support microgravity processing), and has no spare habitation 

space.

One potential commercial service could be beaming of power from a commercial coorbiting free flyer to the ISS, which studies indicate could supply hundreds of kilowatts at 

a fraction of the costs were the ISS to grow its on-board power. A simple commitment by 

the government to buy a certain number of kilowatt hours per year from a commercial 

entity delivered to the ISS would suffice to obtain private funding. This service is typical 

of a number of services that could be provided by commercial ventures:

• local transportation to/from resupply vehicles

• resupply of commodities for ISS operations

• experimentation space and facilities for some experiments

• provision of variable gravity for life sciences experiments if tethered to ISS

• provision of propellantless reboost of ISS using electromagnetic tether.

This would be a good way to begin commercial infrastructure in space, with the 

government being the anchor tenant. The power delivery concept is illustrated in figure 

9–7.

Figure 9–7. Power Delivery to International Space Station

Fast global package delivery. A global reach rocket vehicle, whether just suborbital or 

orbital with deboost, could fly anywhere in the world, spaceport-to-spaceport, in under 2 

hours. This could readily give rise to Global Federal Express–like mail and package 

markets, which studies have shown is a large unmet demand and market. The service 

would be provided by small but fully reusable unmanned vehicles, which a combination 

of SSTO technologies will make feasible, probably in the 2015 to 2020 time period.

This service could be one of the first commercial robotic transportation space 

applications. Studies have shown ready financial feasibility of such a fast global delivery 

service, which would cut the time to deliver a package or document by an order of 
magnitude from today's aircraft-based systems. It would be technically feasible once the 

government reduces the risk of the needed technologies.

Support to lunar base. Many studies have shown that a lunar base has high potential for 

science, exploration, and industrial research. Indeed, a lunar base is the centerpiece of 

NASA's human space exploration plans, which it is planning in the 2020 time frame. 

While it would be a government undertaking to establish the base itself, any such facility 

will need ongoing support in the form of oxygen, propellants, water, surface digging, 

processing plants, and transportation infrastructure. 

Water may well exist as ice in a lunar South Pole crater. The base thus could supply its 

own needs plus those for exploration of other lunar areas. It could export liquid oxygen to 

Earth orbits for propulsion applications. It would begin as a simple outpost, with the 

crews living in the landers, but would soon be followed by a complete and permanent 

base, which would be used as a learning and staging base for forays to Mars and 

elsewhere in the solar system. A more complete facility would follow in the 2020–2030 

time period. It would initially be a government-emplaced and -run facility but would 

transition to being commercially operated, building on the government's investment. This 

operation would be a commercial enterprise of unprecedented magnitude.

Movie studios in orbit. Creating the illusion of free fall (zero gravity) in space movies and 

adventure television series is difficult, expensive, and very limited. Studies have shown 

that habitation modules or converted shuttle external tanks can provide needed volume 

and be outfitted with studio equipment. Such orbital "sound stages" could be owned and 

operated by a film studio, or they could be owned by a consortium and leased to 

individual studios as needed. Studies have shown financial viability of space movie 

studios under the right circumstances. Such studios would be attached to space stations or 

business parks for housekeeping support.

LEO-GEO transfer infrastructure. A permanent low Earth orbit (LEO)-GEO 

transportation infrastructure that is made available to both government and commercial 

users on a fee basis is a distinct possibility in the time period of interest and is enabled by 

the technologies described earlier. While initial infrastructures would use chemical or 

electric propulsion, a particularly intriguing concept is one that uses momentum exchange 

tethers to sling payloads between heavy permanent platforms. The heavy platforms 

transfer energy and momentum to the payload, which is transferred from LEO to GEO 

without consuming any propellants. Each platform adds up to 2,000 meters per second to 

the payload's velocity since the tangential velocity of the spinning tethers adds to the 

orbital velocity when releasing the payload and subtracts from the orbital velocity at the 

catching end to make a zero relative velocity catch. 

The payloads are thus placed into a 6-hour Hohmann transfer trajectory to near-GEO, and 

no propellants are expended in the transfer. Of course, the energy to do so must come 

from somewhere, and indeed it comes from slightly lowering the orbits of the heavy 

platforms, which they then make up with ion propulsion over a longer time at an Isp of 

5,000. Thus, in effect, the payloads are transferred with an effective Isp of 5,000 per 
second, yet the transfer is completed in 6 hours. This is impossible to attain with any 

known propulsion technology. In fact, this tether "ladder" in space works equally well in 

reverse, lowering GEO payloads to LEO for servicing, upgrading, or disposal. 

Eventually, as such systems are emplaced, the GEO traffic will increase greatly, and if 

the "upmass" equals the "downmass" over time, the energy gained by lowering payloads 

from GEO to LEO can be used to boost the next payloads from LEO to GEO, and, except 

for some unavoidable losses, the system requires no energy to operate. Thus, a 

propellantless permanent transportation infrastructure would have been created. This 

infrastructure would be operated by the commercial sector for the Nation (see figure 9–

8). 

Figure 9–8. Propellantless, Reversible LEO–GEO Transportation
Passive power distribution via GEO relay. Large passive radio frequency (RF) reflectors 

in orbit can be used to relay RF energy generated by powerplants in an energy-rich part 

of the globe to other areas that may be energy-poor, where it would be received and 

converted to electricity used to augment the local powergrid. This system would also be 

suitable for rugged or underdeveloped areas where population centers are far apart and 

for countries with no oil, such as Japan. Studies have shown that this means of 

distributing electrical energy is cheaper than wire transmission lines for distances greater 

than about 2,000 kilometers.

The system uses simple meshes or membranes to reflect the RF power, and the spacecraft 

is much lighter and less expensive than those that generate the power in space. A single 
spacecraft would contain several independently steered reflectors so that energy could be 

supplied to a number of destinations. Studies show that a $6-billion investment could 

result in a 35 percent internal rate of return and would be a financially rewarding project 

that could readily find commercial financing (see figure 9–9).

Figure 9–9. Power Relay Using Space Reflectors

Solar power from space. Solar power satellites were conceived by Peter Glaser in 1958. 

The concept of converting abundant, clean, and inexhaustible solar energy into 

microwaves and beaming them to rectennas at receiving facilities connected to the 

powergrid is simple. However, the concept initially used huge structures assembled by 

hundreds of astronauts and was an enormous space program whose technology did not 

exist and whose sizeable investment could not be recouped by the large, noncompetitive 

energy prices that could be charged to customers.

More recent studies were made with modern technology including adaptive membrane 

reflectors, modular robotic assembly, highly efficient solar arrays, medium/low Earth 

orbit constellations, formation flown elements, gravity gradient stabilized configurations, 

efficient solar arrays, microwave or laser beam power delivery, and a whole host of 

modern electronic approaches to the antennas and transmitters. These studies have shown 

that power could be delivered at a price competitive with fossil or nuclear power and that 
a totally renewable and clean energy source could be implemented with little if any 

significant environmental impact, which could solve the world's power and pollution 

problems at the same time. 

Such space solar power systems could be available in the 2030 time period if 

governments lower the technology risk, which is beyond the capability of privately 

financed technological institutions. Such programs represent a huge commercial market 

for entrepreneurial private industry. Power utilities and commercial providers would 

likely team to develop, field, and operate these systems. The very large mass to be orbited 

would be a huge market for development of low-cost launchers, which would be needed 

if the delivered cost of electricity is to be competitive with other options. Thus, although 

this is a long-term proposition and a very large undertaking, it is no larger than many 

other commercial energy plant activities. One LEO concept is illustrated in figure 9–10.

Figure 9–10. Solar Power Delivery from Space
Potential Roadmaps 

The several concepts described in the last section could each represent a major 

commercial space program. In the aggregate, they represent a potentially enormous 

collection of space programs that represents the future of the commercial space sector. 

This potential was assessed by constructing a reasonable but not definitive development 

and operation roadmap plan for each of the programs described above and the annual 

number of launches and the mass launched into space derived for each. Figures 9–11 and 

9–12 illustrate, respectively, the mass in orbit and the number of launches per year 

resulting from these commercial space programs as a function of time through 2080. 

Figure 9–11. Potential Annual Launched Mass
Figure 9–12. Potential Number of Annual World Launches
Inspection of these figures indicates that if these programs develop as postulated, the total 

mass into orbit of these commercial programs will grow rapidly within a decade of their 

introduction and by 2030 will equal the total mass launched into space by all current and 

projected defense and civil space programs. The mass will then grow even more rapidly, 

driven by the space solar power delivery systems and public space travel, becoming two 

orders of magnitude larger than the government programs by 2040 and three orders of 

magnitude larger by 2050 and beyond.

Likewise, an examination of the second figure shows that the annual number of launches 

of large, EELV-class launch vehicles will increase by an order of magnitude by 2035–

2040 and by two orders of magnitude by 2050 and beyond. While it is true that these 

figures were developed for assumed scenarios of development of the individual 

component programs, and it is impossible to predict whether the particular programs will 

be developed, the trends in the figures are inevitable and inescapable.

Perspectives 

The prior sections have laid out a series of potential commercial programs that could 

materialize in about the next 30 years and a potential roadmap for their appearance. It 

must be realized that both the programs themselves and especially their development and 

employment schedules and activity levels are based on the author's educated estimates, as 

there are no hard and fast commitments or schedules for any such applications by any 
entities save for the first public space travel venture by Virgin Galactic and Scaled 

Composites, Inc. Thus, while the programs described are believed to be reasonable 

estimates, their actual appearance is dependent on many commercial, business, and 

technology activities and decisions whose undertaking, let alone outcome, is not possible 

to predict.

These activities will be undertaken principally by the private sector. However, as in many 

advanced technology commercial activities, they could well be preceded by some 

government activities to reduce the risk of those technologies that could have beneficial 

dual use for government activities as well. This could run the range of simple technology 

investment to cooperative government-industry partnerships resulting in demonstrations 

useful to both parties. Indeed, such government investment could be substantial and may 

be key in the start of some commercial activities that would otherwise be unable to raise 

private financing. In addition, inducements could be offered by the government in the 

form of tax incentives, grants of licenses, and other benefits to spur some activities 

perceived to be either dual use or of substantial benefit to the Nation's economy.

Indeed, the government is already investing in fundamental technology developments 

such as research in carbon nanotubes and other advanced technologies that will be 

necessary to fully realize the potential of some of these applications. This investment is 

sponsored by the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency, the Air Force, the 

National Science Foundation, and others. Practically every technologically advanced 

nation is doing likewise due to the extreme promise of carbon nanotubes in a host of 

commercial and military application areas. In addition, many electronics, power, and 

thermal applications of carbon nanotubes are being researched and will probably be the 

first to make it into the commercial electronics marketplace.

The potential for a delay in when some commercial applications might materialize exists 

if the government's financial support of research in this and other science and technology 

areas is reduced substantially—an eventuality that, while not anticipated, cannot be ruled 

out and could have considerable negative effect. However, since there is intense 

international activity in carbon nanotube science and technology, major reductions would 

place the United States behind other nations and therefore are not very likely to occur.

This is particularly true considering that so many commercial products will benefit from 

inclusion or adoption of carbon nanotube technologies. These include consumer 

electronics of every description; structures for cars, trains, airplanes, boats, and ships; 

medical equipment and diagnostic techniques; sporting goods; and many other products 

whose use underpins the economic well being of our country.

This raises the question of what happens to the commercial space applications identified 

should carbon nanotube development fall short of the described progress. In a very real 

sense, none of the commercial programs described in this chapter depend on carbon 

nanotubes. They could just as well be developed and operated with conventional 

materials, though they would be heavier and costlier than if they used carbon nanotubes 

and other advanced technologies. Nonetheless, even if that came to pass, the business 

model and financial feasibility of these programs would still be positive for the most part, 
though their introduction might be delayed to allow demand to compensate for the 

increased price these services would thus feature.

Being able to develop some thoughts on a technology investment strategy to facilitate 

commercial undertakings such as those described herein would seem attractive. 

Unfortunately, even if it would be possible to develop such a strategy, it would have 

questionable utility because it would have to assume myriad critical activities and factors 

that underpin all commercial entrepreneurial ventures and that can only be considered by 

the parties themselves. In addition, the undertaking of any such strategy, even if its 

limitations were to be accepted, would be completely beyond the scope of this chapter. 

Thus, the development of a more specific technology investment strategy and 

development roadmap than the one discussed in the previous section is not possible. 

Based on commercial activity already beginning in public space travel (both suborbital 

and later orbital), it seems evident that these programs, if economically successful, will 

spur technology investment to create the next application. This effect will begin to create 

the momentum for the realization of the second industrial revolution in space that is 

central to this vision for the future of commercial space.

Conclusion 

This chapter has shown that technological advances in the 2010–2020 time period, 

spurred by private capital and some government seed technology investment, will enable 

new commercial products and services, in addition to new government programs. These 

technologies will result in orders-of-magnitude reduction in the costs to develop, orbit, 

and operate space systems for both government and commercial space programs. The 

principal driver will be orders-of-magnitude reduction of launch costs, which will unleash 

explosive growth in new, nontraditional commercial space programs in addition to 

growth in more traditional communications, navigation, location, and sensing commercial 

programs.

By 2030 or beyond, the magnitude of these commercial programs will, in the aggregate, 

exceed all government space programs in the total investment in space systems, in the 

number of annual launches, in the total mass in orbit, and in the infrastructure in orbit. 

The future commercial space program as a whole will represent a second industrial 

revolution—but this time, in space.

These commercial space programs and their ground and space infrastructure will rapidly 

become a vital portion of the Nation's economy, providing energy, information, and 

goods and services on which many people and entities will be dependent. In addition, 

they will be used by defense and intelligence agencies for routine as well as some 

strategic and tactical support of those agencies' objectives. In addition, new commercial 

programs and new uses for programs not even imagined will arise. For all these reasons, 

future commercial programs will become an inseparable aspect of national security and 

will have to be protected against attack, much as airports, planes, trains, and critical 

infrastructure need protection. Any spacepower theory must take this into account.
Chapter 10:

History of Civil Space Activity and Spacepower

Roger D. Launius

<hr size=2 width="100%" align=center> 

The U.S. civil space program emerged in large part because of the pressures of national 

security during the Cold War.1 In general, it has remained tightly interwoven with the 

national security aspects of space. As space policy analyst Dwayne A. Day noted, "The 

history of American civil and military cooperation in space is one of competing interests, 

priorities and justifications at the upper policy levels combined with a remarkable degree 

of cooperation and coordination at virtually all operational levels."2 This has been the 

case throughout the first 50 years of the space age for myriad reasons. First, space 

employs dual-use technologies that are necessary for both military and civil applications. 

These technologies are developed mostly at government expense and sometimes with 

significant in-house government laboratory research by U.S.-owned and -based high 

technology firms, euphemistically called the military-industrial complex. Those firms do 

not much care whether the technologies' end uses are for civil or national security 

purposes, and indeed the same essential knowledge, skills, and technologies are required 

for both human spaceflight missions and national security space operations. The overlap 

of technologies and the related activities necessary to operate them explains much about 

the interwoven nature of civil-military space efforts.3 

A second issue, closely related to the first, is that the military and civil space programs 

have represented essentially two central aspects of a concerted effort over the long haul to 

project national strength. The military component has represented "bare-knuckle" force, 

while the civil space program represented a form of soft power in which pride at home 

and prestige abroad accrued to the United States through successful space activities 

conducted with a sense of peace. Civil space operations also served, in the words of R. 

Cargill Hall, as a "stalking horse" for a clandestine national security effort in space. That 

cover served well the needs of the United States during the Cold War, diverting attention 

from reconnaissance and other national security satellites placed in Earth orbit.4 

Observers certainly recognized the national prestige issue from the beginning of the space 

age. Vernon Van Dyke commented on it in his 1964 book, Pride and Power: The 

Rationale of the Space Program, making the case with scholarly detachment that prestige 

was one of the primary reasons for the United States to undertake its expansive civil 

space effort.5 In the words of reviewer John P. Lovell, "Van Dyke marshals convincing 

evidence in support of the thesis that 'national pride' has served as the goal value most 

central to the motivation of those who have given the space program its major impetus."6 

Although his research is certainly dated, Van Dyke's conclusions hold up surprisingly 

well after the passage of more than 45 years. At a fundamental level, American 

Presidents have consciously used these activities as a symbol of national excellence to 

enhance the prestige of the United States throughout the world.7 
Third, the gradual process whereby the political leadership of the United States—

especially the Dwight D. Eisenhower and John F. Kennedy administrations—decided 

which governmental organizations should take responsibility for which space missions 

led to persistent and sometime sharp difficulties.8 Several military entities, especially U.S. 

Air Force leaders, had visions of dominating the new arena of space, visions that were 

only partially realized. This proved especially troubling in the context of human 

spaceflight, when early advocates believed military personnel would be required. In 

essence, they thought of space as a new theater of conflict just like land, sea, and air and 

chafed under the decision of Eisenhower, reaffirmed to the present, to make space a 

sanctuary from armed operations. One important result of that decision was the 

elimination of military human missions in space, a bitter pill for national security space 

adherents even today. Indeed, the insistence on flying military astronauts on the space 

shuttle until the Challenger accident in 1986 represented an important marker for future 

developments. It may also be that in some advocates' minds, the current debate over 

space weaponization represents an opportunity to gain a human military mission in 

space.9 

After a brief introduction to the space policy arena in the early years of the space age, the 

remainder of this chapter will explore these three themes— dual-use technology, the role 

of soft power and the prestige and pride issue in national security affairs, and the quest 

for military personnel in space. 

National Security and the Space Program during the Cold War 

Since the latter 1940s, the Department of Defense (DOD) has pursued research in 

rocketry and upper atmospheric sciences as a means of assuring American leadership in 

technology. The civilian side of the space effort can be said to have begun in 1952 when 

the International Council of Scientific Unions established a committee to arrange an 

International Geophysical Year (IGY) for the period of July 1, 1957, to December 31, 

1958. After years of preparation, on July 29, 1955, the U.S. scientific community 

persuaded President Eisenhower to approve a plan to orbit a scientific satellite as part of 

the IGY effort. With the launch of Sputnik I and II by the Soviet Union in the fall of 1957 

and the American orbiting of Explorer 1 in January 1958, the space race commenced and 

did not abate until the end of the Cold War—although there were lulls in the 

competition.10 The most visible part of this competition was the human spaceflight 

program—with the Moon landings by Apollo astronauts as de rigueur—but the effort also 

entailed robotic missions to several planets of the solar system, military and commercial 

satellite activities, and other scientific and technological labors.11 In the post–Cold War 

era, the space exploration agenda underwent significant restructuring and led to such 

cooperative ventures as the International Space Station and the development of launchers, 

science missions, and applications satellites through international consortia.12 

Role of Adventure and Discovery 

Undoubtedly, adventure, discovery, and the promise of exploration and colonization were 

the motivating forces behind the small cadre of early space program advocates in the 
United States prior to the 1950s. Most advocates of aggressive space exploration efforts 

invoked an extension of the popular notion of the American frontier with its thenattendant positive images of territorial discovery, scientific discovery, exploration, 

colonization, and use.13 Indeed, the image of the American frontier has been an especially 

evocative and somewhat romantic, as well as popular, argument to support the aggressive 

exploration of space. It plays to the popular conception of "westering" and the settlement 

of the American continent by Europeans from the East that was a powerful metaphor of 

national identity until the 1970s. 

The space promoters of the 1950s and 1960s intuited that this set of symbols provided a 

vigorous explanation for and justification of their efforts. The metaphor was probably 

appropriate for what they wanted to accomplish. It conjured up an image of self-reliant 

Americans moving westward in sweeping waves of discovery, exploration, conquest, and 

settlement of an untamed wilderness. In the process of movement, the Europeans who 

settled North America became, in their own eyes, a people imbued with virtue and 

justness, unique from all the others of the Earth. The frontier ideal has always carried 

with it the principles of optimism, democracy, and right relationships. It has been almost 

utopian in its expression, and it should come as no surprise that those people seeking to 

create perfect societies in the 17th, 18th, and 19th centuries—the Puritans, the Mormons, the 

Shakers, the Moravians, the Fourians, the Icarians, the followers of Horace Greeley—

often went to the frontier to carry out their visions. 

It also summoned in the popular mind a wide range of vivid and memorable tales of 

heroism, each a morally justified step of progress toward the modern democratic state. 

While the frontier ideal reduced the complexity of events to a relatively static morality 

play, avoided matters that challenged or contradicted the myth, viewed Americans 

moving westward as inherently good and their opponents as evil, and ignored the cultural 

context of westward migration, it served a critical unifying purpose for the Nation. Those 

who were persuaded by this metaphor—and most white Americans in 1960 did not 

challenge it—embraced the vision of space exploration.14 

Role ofPopular Conceptions of SpaceTravel 

If the frontier metaphor of space exploration conjured up romantic images of an 

American nation progressing to something for the greater good, the space advocates of 

the Eisenhower era also sought to convince the public that space exploration was an 

immediate possibility. Science fiction books and films portrayed space exploration, but 

more importantly, its possibility was fostered by serious and respected scientists, 

engineers, and politicians. Deliberate efforts on the part of space boosters during the late 

1940s and early 1950s helped to reshape the popular culture of space and to influence 

government policy. In particular, these advocates worked hard to overcome the level of 

disbelief that had been generated by two decades of "Buck Rogers"–type fantasies and to 

convince the American public that space travel might actually, for the first time in human 

history, be possible.15 
The decade following World War II brought a sea change in perceptions, as most 

Americans moved from being skeptical about the probability of spaceflight to accepting it 

as a near-term reality. This shift can be seen in the public opinion polls of the era. For 

instance, in December 1949, Gallup pollsters found that only 15 percent of Americans 

believed humans would reach the Moon within 50 years, while a whopping 70 percent 

believed that it would not happen within that time. By 1957, 41 percent believed firmly 

that it would not take longer than 25 years for humans to reach the Moon, while only 25 

percent believed that it would. An important shift in perceptions had taken place during 

that era, and it was largely the result of a public relations campaign based on the real 

possibility of spaceflight coupled with the well-known advances in rocket technology.16 

The American public became aware of the possibility of spaceflight through sources 

ranging from science fiction literature and film that were closer to reality than ever 

before, to speculations by science fiction writers about possibilities already real, to 

serious discussions of the subject in respected popular magazines. Among the most 

important serious efforts were those of German émigré Wernher von Braun, who was 

working for the U.S. Army at Huntsville, Alabama. Von Braun, in addition to being a 

superbly effective technological entrepreneur, managed to seize the powerful print and 

communications media that the science fiction writers and filmmakers had been using in 

the early 1950s and became a highly effective promoter of space exploration to the 

public.17 

In 1952, von Braun burst on the public stage with a series of articles in Collier's 

magazine about the possibilities of spaceflight. The first issue of Collier's devoted to 

space appeared on March 22, 1952. An editorial in that issue suggested that spaceflight 

was possible, not just science fiction, and that it was inevitable that mankind would 

venture outward. In his articles, von Braun advocated the orbiting of humans, 

development of a reusable spacecraft for travel to and from Earth orbit, construction of a 

permanently inhabited space station, and human exploration of the Moon and Mars by 

spacecraft departing from the space station. The series concluded with a special issue of 

the magazine devoted to Mars, in which von Braun and others described how to get there 

and predicted what might be found based on recent scientific data.

18 

The merging of the public perception of spaceflight as a near-term reality with the 

technological developments then being seen at White Sands and other experimental 

facilities created an environment conducive to the establishment of an aggressive space 

program. Convincing the American public that spaceflight was possible was one of the 

most critical components of the space policy debate of the 1950s. Without it, the 

aggressive exploration programs of the 1960s would never have been approved. For a 

concept to be approved in the public policy arena, the public must have both an 

appropriate vision of the phenomenon with which the society seeks to grapple and 

confidence in the attainability of the goal. Indeed, space enthusiasts were so successful in 

promoting their image of human spaceflight as being imminent that when other 

developments forced public policymakers to consider the space program seriously, 

alternative visions of space exploration remained ill formed, and even advocates of 

different futures emphasizing robotic probes and applications satellites were obliged to 
discuss space exploration using the symbols of the human space travel vision that its 

promoters had established so well in the minds of Americans.19 

Role of ForeignPolicy and National Security Issues 

At the same time that space exploration advocates, both amateurs and scientists, were 

generating an image of spaceflight as a genuine possibility and proposing how to 

accomplish a far-reaching program of lunar and planetary exploration, another critical 

element entered the picture: the role of spaceflight in national defense and international 

relations. Space partisans early began hitching their exploration vision to the political 

requirements of the Cold War, in particular to the belief that the nation that occupied the 

"high ground" of space would dominate the territories underneath it. In the first of the 

Collier's articles in 1952, the exploration of space was framed in the context of the Cold 

War rivalry with the Soviet Union and concluded that "the time has come for Washington 

to give priority of attention to the matter of space superiority. The rearmament gap 

between the East and West has been steadily closing. And nothing, in our opinion, should 

be left undone that might guarantee the peace of the world. It's as simple as that." The 

magazine's editors argued "that the U.S. must immediately embark on a long-range 

development program to secure for the West 'space superiority.' If we do not, somebody 

else will. That somebody else very probably would be the Soviet Union."20 

The synthesis of the idea of progress manifested through the frontier, the selling of 

spaceflight as a reality in American popular culture, and the Cold War rivalries between 

the United States and the Soviet Union made possible the adoption of an aggressive space 

program by the early 1960s. The National Aeronautics and Space Administration 

(NASA) effort through Project Apollo, with its emphasis upon human spaceflight and 

extraterrestrial exploration, emerged from these three major ingredients, with Cold War 

concerns the dominant driver behind monetary appropriations for space efforts. 

The Heroic Age of Space Exploration 

Rivalry with the Soviet Union was the key that opened the door to aggressive space 

exploration, not as an end in itself, but as a means to achieving technological superiority 

in the eyes of the world. From the perspective of the 21st century, it is difficult to 

appreciate Americans' near-hysterical preoccupation with nuclear attack in the 1950s. Far 

from being the idyll portrayed in the television show "Happy Days," the United States 

was a dysfunctional nation preoccupied with death by nuclear war. Schools required 

children to practice civil defense techniques and shield themselves from nuclear blasts, in 

some cases by simply crawling under their desks. Communities practiced civil defense 

drills, and families built personal bomb shelters in their backyards.21 In the popular 

culture, nuclear attack was inexorably linked to the space above the United States, from 

which the attack would come. 

After an arms race with its nuclear component, a series of hot and cold crises in the 

Eisenhower era, and the launching of Sputniks I and II in 1957, the threat of holocaust 

felt by most Americans and Soviets seemed increasingly probable. For the first time, 
enemies could reach the United States with a radical new technology. In the contest over 

the ideologies and allegiances of the world's nonaligned nations, space exploration 

became contested ground.22 Even while U.S. officials congratulated the Soviet Union for 

this accomplishment, many Americans thought that the Soviet Union had staged a 

tremendous coup for the communist system at U.S. expense. It was a shock, introducing 

the illusion of a technological gap and leading directly to several critical efforts aimed at 

catching up to the Soviet Union's space achievements. Among these efforts were: 

• a full-scale review of both the civil and military programs of the United States 

(scientific satellite efforts and ballistic missile development) 

• establishment of a Presidential science advisor in the White House who would 

oversee the activities of the Federal Government in science and technology 

• creation of the Advanced Research Projects Agency (ARPA) in the Department of 

Defense, and the consolidation of several space activities under centralized 

management 

• establishment of NASA to manage civil space operations 

• passage of the National Defense Education Act to provide Federal funding for

education in the scientific and technical disciplines.23

More immediately, the United States launched its first Earth satellite on January 31, 

1958, when Explorer I documented the existence of radiation zones encircling the Earth. 

Shaped by the Earth's magnetic field, what came to be called the Van Allen radiation belt 

partially dictates the electrical charges in the atmosphere and the solar radiation that 

reaches Earth. It also began a series of scientific missions to the Moon and planets in the 

latter 1950s and early 1960s.24 

Congress passed and President Eisenhower signed the National Aeronautics and Space 

Act of 1958, which established NASA with a broad mandate to explore and use space for 

"peaceful purposes for the benefit of all mankind."25 The core of NASA came from the 

earlier National Advisory Committee for Aeronautics, which had 8,000 employees, an 

annual budget of $100 million, and research laboratories. It quickly incorporated other 

organizations into the new agency, notably the space science group of the Naval Research 

Laboratory in Maryland, the Jet Propulsion Laboratory managed by the California 

Institute of Technology for the Army, and the Army Ballistic Missile Agency in 

Huntsville, Alabama.26 

The Soviet Union, while not creating a separate organization dedicated to space 

exploration, infused money into its various rocket design bureaus and scientific research 

institutions. The chief beneficiaries of Soviet spaceflight enthusiasm were the design 

bureau of Sergei P. Korolev (the chief designer of the first Soviet rockets used for the 

Sputnik program) and the Soviet Academy of Sciences, which devised experiments and 

built the instruments that were launched into orbit. With huge investments in spaceflight 

technology urged by premier Nikita Khrushchev, the Soviet Union accomplished one 

public relations coup after another against the United States during the late 1950s and 

early 1960s.27 
Within a short time of its formal organization, NASA also took over management of 

space exploration projects from other Federal agencies and began to conduct space 

science missions, such as Project Ranger to send probes to the Moon, Project Echo to test 

the possibility of satellite communications, and Project Mercury to ascertain the 

possibilities of human spaceflight. Even so, these activities were constrained by a modest 

budget and a measured pace on the part of NASA leadership. 

In an irony of the first magnitude, Eisenhower believed that the creation of NASA and 

the placing of so much power in its hands by the Kennedy administration during the 

Apollo program of the 1960s was a mistake. He remarked in a 1962 article: "Why the 

great hurry to get to the moon and the planets? We have already demonstrated that in 

everything except the power of our booster rockets we are leading the world in scientific 

space exploration. From here on, I think we should proceed in an orderly, scientific way, 

building one accomplishment on another."28 He later cautioned that the Moon race "has 

diverted a disproportionate share of our brain-power and research facilities from equally 

significant problems, including education and automation."29 He believed that Americans 

had overreacted to the perceived threat. 

During the first 15 years of the space age, the United States emphasized a civilian 

exploration program consisting of several major components. The capstone of this effort 

was, of course, the human expedition to the Moon, Project Apollo. A unique confluence 

of political necessity, personal commitment and activism, scientific and technological 

ability, economic prosperity, and public mood made possible the May 25, 1961, 

announcement by President John F. Kennedy of the intent to carry out a lunar landing 

program before the end of the decade as a means of demonstrating the Nation's 

technological virtuosity.30 

Project Apollo was the tangible result of an early national commitment in response to a 

perceived threat from the Soviet Union. NASA leaders recognized that while the size of 

the task was enormous, it was technologically and financially within their grasp, but they 

had to move forward quickly. Accordingly, the space agency's annual budget increased 

from $500 million in 1960 to a high point of $5.2 billion in 1965. NASA's budget began 

to decline beginning in 1966 and continued on a downward trend until 1975. With the 

exception of a few years during the Apollo era, the NASA budget has hovered at slightly 

less than one percent of all money expended by the U.S. Treasury (see figure 10–1).31 

Figure 10–1. NASA Budgets as a Percentage of Federal Budget
While there may be reason to accept that Apollo was transcendentally important at some 

sublime level, assuming a rosy public acceptance of it is at best a simplistic and 

ultimately unsatisfactory conclusion. Indeed, the public's support for space funding has 

remained remarkably stable at approximately 80 percent in favor of the status quo since 

1965, with only one significant dip in support in the early 1970s. However, responses to 

funding questions on public opinion polls are extremely sensitive to question wording 

and must be used cautiously.32 Polls in the 1960s consistently ranked spaceflight near the 

top of those programs to be cut in the Federal budget. Most Americans seemingly 

preferred doing something about air and water pollution, job training for unskilled 

workers, national beautification, and poverty before spending Federal funds on human 

spaceflight. In 1967, Newsweek stated: "The U.S. space program is in decline. The 

Vietnam war and the desperate conditions of the nation's poor and its cities— which 

make spaceflight seem, in comparison, like an embarrassing national self-indulgence—

have combined to drag down a program where the sky was no longer the limit."33 

Nor did lunar exploration in and of itself inspire a groundswell of popular support from 

the general public, which during the 1960s largely showed hesitancy to "race" the Soviets 

to the Moon (see figure10–2). Polls asked, "Would you favor or oppose U.S. government 

spending to send astronauts to the moon?" and in virtually all cases, a majority opposed 

doing so, even during the height of Apollo. At only one point, October 1965, did more 

than half of the public favor continuing human lunar exploration. In the post-Apollo era, 

the American public has continued to question the validity of undertaking human 

expeditions to the Moon.34 

Figure 10–2. Public Attitudes about Government Funding for Space Trips
These statistics do not demonstrate unqualified support for NASA's effort to reach the 

Moon in the 1960s. They suggest, instead, that the Cold War national security crisis that 

brought public support to the initial lunar landing decision was fleeting, and within a 

short period the coalition that announced it had to retrench.35 It also suggests that the 

public was never enthusiastic about human lunar exploration, and especially about the 

costs associated with it. What enthusiasm it may have enjoyed waned over time, until by 

the end of the Apollo program in December 1972, the program was akin to a limping 

marathoner straining with every muscle to reach the finish line before collapsing. 

The Space Program and Dual-use Technology 

The reality, if not the definition, of dual-use technology has existed since humanity first 

fashioned a weapon and then used it for some other nonviolent purpose. Certainly, spears, 

bows and arrows, swords, clubs, firearms, and a host of other implements have dual uses 

for both destructive and constructive purposes. Even as nondescript a tool as a shovel has 

a military use as an implement for digging fortifications and as a crude weapon in handto-hand combat. During the Cold War, this concept of dual-use technology reached a 

crescendo in the context of nuclear weapons in general and their delivery systems in 

particular. It also found explicit situating within international agreements such as the 

Nonproliferation Treaty, the 1987 Missile Technology Control Regime, and the 

Wassenaar Arrangement on Export Controls for Conventional Arms and Dual-Use Goods 

and Technologies.36 The Wassenaar accord is by far the most sweeping in its attempt to 

govern the transfer of dual-use space technologies. Interestingly, remote sensing, 

navigation, and communications satellite policies emerged first as the technologies 

requiring governance, with launch vehicle technology being added later. This was in no 

small part because of the perception that nuclear weapons launchers did not present a 
problem for the enhancement of military capability. Only later in the 20th century did U.S. 

officials wake up to the realization that the spread of launcher technology to so-called 

rogue states such as North Korea, Iraq, and other potential enemies posed a threat to 

national interests.37 

Launch vehicles developed for the delivery of nuclear weapons unquestionably had dual 

use as civil space launchers with minimum, if any, alteration. Most of the launchers used 

by NASA during its formative years originated as military ballistic missiles that DOD 

had developed (see figure10–3). It was, and remains, the fundamental technology 

necessary for civil space exploration, and it came largely from the military. Throughout 

the late 1940s and early 1950s, rocket technicians working for DOD conducted ever more 

demanding test flights, and scientists conducted increasingly complex scientific 

investigations made possible by this new dual-use technology.38 The Army developed the 

Redstone rocket during this period, a missile capable of sending a small warhead a 

maximum of 500 miles, and its dual use became obvious when NASA used it to send the 

first U.S. suborbital Mercury missions with astronauts Alan B. Shepard and Gus Grissom 

into space in 1961.39 The same was true for the Air Force's Atlas and Titan 

intercontinental ballistic missiles (ICBMs), originally developed to deliver nuclear 

warheads to targets half a world away. The Atlas found important uses as the launcher for 

the Mercury program's orbital missions, and the Titan served well as the launcher for the 

Gemini program human spaceflights in 1965–1966.40 

Figure 10–3. Launch Vehicles, 1953-2000

But the application of military rocket technology to the civil space program was neither 

automatic nor especially easy. As a converted ICBM, for example, the Atlas had 
undergone on-again, off-again development since 1946. Canceled once and underfunded 

thereafter, the Air Force had been unable until the Sputnik crisis of 1957–1958 to secure 

sufficient resources to make serious progress on it. Because of this difficulty, U.S. Air 

Force officials had accepted a 20 percent failure rate. This rate offered the fundamental 

argument against using the Atlas in the civil space program; no one was willing to accept 

the loss of one out of five missions with astronauts aboard. But even that rate proved 

higher in the early going. By 1959, seven out of eight launches had failed. That would 

most assuredly not do with astronauts aboard. NASA's Robert R. Gilruth testified to 

Congress about this problem in mid-1959: "The Atlas . . . has enough performance . . . 

and the guidance system is accurate enough, but there is the matter of reliability. You

don't want to put a man in a device unless it has a very good chance of working every 

time." Gilruth added, "Reliability is something that comes with practice."41 

Incrementally, NASA, Air Force, and contract engineers improved the performance of 

the Atlas. They placed a fiberglass shield around the liquid oxygen tank to keep the 

engines from igniting it in a massive explosion, a rather spectacular failure that seemed to 

happen at least half the time. They changed out almost every system on the vehicle, 

substituting tried and true technology wherever possible to minimize problems. They 

altered procedures and developed new telemetry to monitor the operations of the system. 

Most important, they developed an abort sensing system (labeled ASS by everyone but 

the people involved in developing it) to monitor vehicle performance and to provide early 

escape for astronauts from the Mercury capsule.42 

Transition to the Titan launcher for the Gemini program was also far from automatic. It 

experienced longitudinal oscillations, called the "pogo" effect because it resembled the 

behavior of a child on a pogo stick. Overcoming this problem required engineering 

imagination and long hours of overtime to stabilize fuel flow and maintain vehicle 

control. Other problems also led to costly modifications, increasing the estimated $350 

million program cost to over $1 billion. The overruns were successfully justified by the 

space agency, however, as necessities to meet the Apollo landing commitment, but not 

without some sustained criticism.43 

The dual-use nature of this launch technology has long presented serious challenges for 

the interrelations of the civil and national security space programs. Moreover, this 

reliance on the descendants of the three major ballistic missiles—Atlas, Titan, and what 

became the Delta—developed in the 1950s and 1960s for the bulk of the Nation's space 

access requirements has hampered space access to the present. Even though the three 

families of expendable space boosters—each with numerous variants—have enjoyed 

incremental improvement since first flight, there seems no way to escape their beginnings 

in technology (dating back to the 1950s) and their primary task of launching nuclear 

warheads. National defense requirements prompted the developers to emphasize schedule 

and operational reliability over launch costs. 

Movement beyond these first-generation launchers is critical for the opening of space 

access to more activities. Like the earlier experience with propeller-driven aircraft, 

launchers have been incrementally improved for the last 40 years without making a major 
breakthrough in technology. Accordingly, the United States today has a very efficient and 

mature expendable launch vehicle (ELV) launch capability that is still unable to 

overcome the limitations of the first-generation ICBM launch vehicles.44 

The overpowering legacy of the space shuttle has also dominated the issue of space 

access since Project Apollo, and it has enjoyed dual use as both a military and civil 

launcher. Approved in 1972 by President Richard M. Nixon as the major NASA followon program to the highly successful Moon landings, the space shuttle would provide 

routine, economical, and reliable indefinite access to space for the U.S. human 

spaceflight program.45 With the first spaceflight of the Columbia in 1981, NASA's human 

spaceflight capability became wedded to the space shuttle, and moving beyond that basic 

coupling has required 20 years. In addition to forestalling debate on a shuttle 

replacement, the decision to build the space shuttle in 1972 short-circuited debate on the 

desirability of investment in new ELVs. At first, NASA and most other space policy 

analysts agreed that the shuttle would become the "one-size-fits-all" space launcher of the 

U.S. fleet. There would be, simply put, no need for another vehicle since the shuttle could 

satisfy all launch requirements, be they scientific, commercial, or military, human or 

robotic.46 The military Services at first agreed to launch all of their payloads on the 

shuttle, and NASA aggressively marketed the shuttle as a commercial vehicle that could 

place any satellite into orbit.47 

This was never a perfect situation, for in the truest sense of dual usage, the shuttle was 

shouldering the responsibility for all government launches and many commercial ones 

during the early Reagan years. It was, sadly, ill equipped to satisfy these demands. Even 

with the best of intentions and with attractive payload pricing policies, the space shuttle 

remained what it had been intended to be in the first place: a research and development 

vehicle that would push the frontiers of spaceflight and knowledge about the universe. 

The desire for the shuttle to be all things to all people—research and development 

aerospace vehicle, operational space truck, commercial carrier, scientific platform—

ensured that it would satisfy none of these singular and mutually exclusive missions.48 

Only with the loss of the Challenger on January 28, 1986, did this reliance on the space 

shuttle begin to change. It reinvigorated a debate over the use of the space shuttle to 

launch all U.S. satellites. In August 1986, President Reagan announced that the shuttle 

would no longer carry commercial satellites, a policy formalized in December 1986 in 

National Security Decision Directive 254, "United States Space Launch Strategy." A total 

of 44 commercial and foreign payloads that had been manifested on the space shuttle 

were forced to find new launchers.49 

For the next 3 years, the U.S. Government worked to reinvigorate the American ELV 

production lines and to redesign and modify satellites to be launched on ELVs instead of 

the shuttle. The shift back to ELVs required additional government funding to fix the 

problems that had resulted from years of planning to retire these systems. The United 

States practically ceased commercial launch activities for several years, conducting just 

three commercial satellite launches (one just prior to the Challenger flight) for only 6 

percent of U.S. space launches from 1986 to 1989.50 
During this period, however, two actions were initiated that enabled the emergence of a 

legitimate U.S. launch industry. First, DOD committed to purchasing a large number of 

ELVs as part of a strategy to maintain access to space using a mixed fleet of both the 

space shuttle and ELVs. This reopened the dormant U.S. ELV production lines at 

government expense and helped provide economies of scale necessary to enable U.S. 

companies to effectively compete against Ariane. Second, in 1988, Congress amended 

the Commercial Space Launch Act (CSLA) to establish new insurance requirements 

whose effect was to limit liability for U.S. companies in case their launches caused 

damage to government property or third parties. The revised CSLA also established 

protections against government preemption of commercial launches on government 

ranges.51 

As a result, the first U.S. commercial space launch took place in 1989— nearly 5 years 

after the CSLA was passed. Beginning in 1989, U.S. launches of commercial satellites 

were conducted by commercial launch companies (in most cases, the same companies 

providing launch services for DOD and NASA payloads as government contractors), not 

the U.S. Government.52 

There is much more to this story of space access and the nature of dual-use technology, 

but I will conclude with these observations. The commonality of this technology has 

meant one of two things for both military and civil space efforts: either a competition for 

knowledge and capability among a limited pool of suppliers, or a cooperation to achieve 

a fleet of dual-use machines that satisfy all users. In many cases this has never happened, 

and the differences between NASA and DOD have been persistent and at times quite 

combative. 

Only when there has been clear delineation of responsibilities has this absence of 

collaboration not been the case. For example, on April 16, 1991, the National Space 

Council directed NASA and DOD to jointly fund and develop the National Launch 

System to meet civil and military space access by the beginning of the 21st century at a 

cost of between $10.5 billion and $12 billion.53 This effort failed. Most of the other efforts 

to cooperate have not been much more successful. It seems that the best results have 

come when either the civil or the military side of the space program develops its own 

technologies, at least in space launch, and the other adapts it for its own use. That was the 

case with NASA employing launchers originally designed as ballistic missiles in the 

1960s and DOD using the space shuttle built by NASA in the 1980s. The landscape is 

littered with failed cooperative projects in space access.54 

Prestige and Soft Power on the International Stage 

From the early days of thought about the potential of flight in space, theorists believed 

that the activity would garner worldwide prestige for those accomplishing it. For 

example, in 1946, the newly established RAND Corporation published the study 

"Preliminary Design of an Experimental World-Circling Spaceship." This publication 

explored the viability of orbital satellites and outlined the technologies necessary for its 

success. Among its many observations, its comment on the prestige factor proved 
especially prescient: "A satellite vehicle with appropriate instrumentation can be 

expected to be one of the most potent scientific tools of the Twentieth Century. The 

achievement of a satellite craft would produce repercussions comparable to the explosion 

of the atomic bomb."55 

This perspective is a classic application of what analysts often refer to as soft power. The 

term, coined by Harvard University professor Joseph Nye, gave a name to an alternative 

to threats and other forms of hard power in international relations.56 As Nye contends: 

Soft power is the ability to get what you want by attracting and persuading 

others to adopt your goals. It differs from hard power, the ability to use the 

carrots and sticks of economic and military might to make others follow 

your will. Both hard and soft power are important . . . but attraction is 

much cheaper than coercion, and an asset that needs to be nourished.57 

In essence, such activities as Apollo represented a form of soft power, the ability to 

influence other nations through intangibles such as an impressive show of technological 

capability. It granted to the nation achieving it first an authenticity and gravitas not 

previously enjoyed among the world community. In sum, this was an argument 

buttressing the role of spaceflight as a means of enhancing a nation's standing on the 

international stage. 

Even so, few appreciated the potential of spaceflight to enhance national prestige until the 

Sputnik crisis of 1957–1958. Some have characterized this as an event that had a "Pearl 

Harbor" effect on American public opinion, creating an illusion of a technological gap 

and providing the impetus for increased spending for aerospace endeavors, technical and 

scientific educational programs, and the chartering of new Federal agencies to manage air 

and space research and development. This Cold War rivalry with the Soviet Union 

provided the key that opened the door to aggressive space exploration, not as an end in 

itself, but as a means to achieving technological superiority in the eyes of the world. 

From the perspective of the 21st century, it is difficult to appreciate the importance of the 

prestige factor in national thinking at the time. Although the initial response was 

congratulatory, American political and opinion leaders soon expressed a belief in the loss 

of national prestige. As the Chicago Daily News editorialized on October 7, 1957, "It 

must be obvious to everyone by now that the situation relative to Russian technology and 

our own has changed drastically. There can be no more underestimating Russia's 

scientific potential, either for war or for peace."58 

Political leaders also used the satellite as an object lesson in prestige. Senate majority 

leader Lyndon B. Johnson recalled of the Soviet launch, "Now, somehow, in some new 

way, the sky seemed almost alien. I also remember the profound shock of realizing that it 

might be possible for another nation to achieve technological superiority over this great 

country of ours."59 

One of Johnson's aides, George E. Reedy, wrote to him on October 17, 1957, about how 

they could use the Sputnik issue to the party's advantage: "The issue is one which, if 
properly handled, would blast the Republicans out of the water, unify the Democratic 

Party, and elect you President." He suggested that "it is unpleasant to feel that there is 

something floating around in the air which the Russians can put up and we can't."60 

Unquestionably, the Apollo program in particular and all of U.S. human spaceflight 

efforts in general were mainly about establishing U.S. primacy in technology. Apollo 

served as a surrogate for war, challenging the Soviet Union head on in a demonstration of 

technological virtuosity. The desire towin international support for the "American way" 

became the raison d'etre for the Apollo program, and it served that purpose far better than 

anyone imagined when first envisioned. Apollo became first and foremost a Cold War 

initiative and aided in demonstrating the mastery of the United States before the world. 

This motivation may be seen in a succession of Gallup polls conducted during the 1960s 

that asked, "Is the Soviet Union ahead of the United States in space?" Until the middle 

part of the decade— about the time that the Gemini program began to demonstrate 

American prowess in space—the answer was always yes. At the height of the Apollo 

Moon landings, world opinion had shifted overwhelmingly in favor of the United 

States.61 The importance of Apollo as an instrument of U.S. foreign policy—which is 

closely allied to but not necessarily identical with national prestige and geopolitics—

should not be mislaid in this discussion. It served, and continues to serve, as an 

instrument for projecting the image of a positive, open, dynamic American society 

abroad. 

For decades, the United States launched humans into space for prestige, measured against 

similar Soviet accomplishments, rather than for practical scientific or research goals. This 

was in essence positive symbolism—each new space achievement acquired political 

capital for the United States, primarily on the international stage. As Caspar Weinberger 

noted in 1971, space achievements gave "the people of the world an equally needed look 

at American superiority."62 

In this context, the civil space program, both its human and robotic components, was 

fully about national security. Demonstrations of U.S. scientific and technological

capability were about the need to establish the credibility and reliability of nuclear 

deterrence in this new type of standoff with the Soviet Union (see figure10–4). If the 

Soviets did not believe that credibility was real, if the rest of the world thought it bogus, 

the American rivalry with the Soviet Union portended a dire future for humankind. 

American success in space offered a perception of credibility worldwide about its 

military might. "This contest was rooted in proving to the world the superiority of 

capitalism over communism, of the American and communist ways of life, and of 

cultural, economic, and scientific achievements," according to historian Kenneth Osgood. 

American civil space successes served to counteract those questioning the nature of the 

future.63 

Figure 10–4. Is the Soviet Union Ahead of the United States in Space?
The importance of this prestige issue for civil space also worked at home. It conjured 

images of the best in the human spirit and served, in the words of journalist Greg

Easterbrook, as "a metaphor of national inspiration: majestic,technologically advanced, 

produced at dear cost and entrusted with precious cargo, rising above the constraints of 

the earth." It "carries our secret hope that there is something better out there—a world 

where we may someday go and leave the sorrows of the past behind."64 It may well be 

that space achievements, particularly those involving direct human presence, remain a 

potent source of national pride and that such pride is why the U.S. public continues to 

support human spaceflight. Certainly, space images— an astronaut on the Moon or the 

space shuttle rising majestically into orbit—rank just below the American flag and the 

bald eagle as patriotic symbols. The self-image of the United States as a successful nation 

is threatened when we fail in our space efforts, as we have seen from the collective loss 

when astronauts die before our eyes in space shuttle accidents. Americans expect a 

successful program of civil spaceflight as part of what the United States does as a nation. 

Americans are not overly concerned with the content or objectives of specific programs. 

But they are concerned that what is done seems worth doing and is done well. It is that 

sense of pride in space accomplishment that has been missing in recent years.65 

The Military and the Quest for a Human Mission in Space 

Even before the beginning of the space age, DOD had angled for the mission of placing 

humans in space for myriad tasks. In the early 1950s, Wernher von Braun had proposed a 

massive space station with more than 50 military personnel aboard to undertake Earth 

observation for reconnaissance and as an orbiting battle station. He even believed it could 

be used to launch nuclear missile strikes against the Soviet Union.66 While von Braun 
could not get any Eisenhower administration authorities to adopt his space station plan, 

some senior DOD officials did see a role for military astronauts. The U.S. Air Force 

proposed the development of a piloted orbital spacecraft under the "Man-in-SpaceSoonest" (MISS) program in 1957.67 After the launch of Sputnik I, the Air Force invited 

Edward Teller and several other leading members of the scientific and technological elite 

to study the issue of human spaceflight and make recommendations for the future. 

Teller's group concluded that the Air Force could place a human in orbit within 2 years 

and urged that the department pursue this effort. Teller understood, however, that there 

was essentially no military reason for undertaking this mission and chose not to tie his 

recommendation to any specific rationale, falling back on a basic belief that the first 

nation to accomplish human spaceflight would accrue national prestige and advance, in a 

general manner, science and technology.68 

Soon after the new year, Lieutenant General Donald L. Putt, the Air Force Deputy Chief 

of Staff for Development, informed National Advisory Committee for Aeronautics 

(NACA) Director Hugh L. Dryden of the Service's intention to pursue aggressively "a 

research vehicle program having as its objective the earliest possible manned orbital 

flight which will contribute substantially and essentially to follow-on scientific and 

military space systems." Putt asked Dryden to collaborate in this effort, but with the 

NACA as a decidedly junior partner.69 Dryden agreed; however, by the end of the 

summer, Putt would find the newly created NASA leading the human spaceflight effort 

for the United States, with the Air Force being the junior player.70 

Notwithstanding the lack of clear-cut military purpose, the Air Force pressed for MISS 

throughout the first part of 1958, clearly expecting to become the lead agency in any 

space program of the United States. Specifically, it believed hypersonic space planes and 

lunar bases would serve national security needs well in the coming decades. To help 

make that a reality, it requested $133 million for the MISS program and secured approval 

for the effort from the Joint Chiefs of Staff.71 Throughout this period, a series of 

disagreements between Air Force and NACA officials rankled both sides. The difficulties 

reverberated all the way to the White House, prompting a review of the roles of the two 

organizations.72 The normally staid and proper Hugh Dryden complained in July 1958 to 

the President's science advisor, James R. Killian, of the lack of clarity on the role of the 

Air Force versus the NACA. He asserted that: 

The current objective for a manned satellite program is the determination 

of man's basic capability in a space environment as a prelude to the human 

exploration of space and to possible military applications of manned 

satellites. Although it is clear that both the National Aeronautics and 

Space Administration and the Department of Defense should cooperate in 

the conduct of the program, I feel that the responsibility for and the 

direction of the program should rest with NASA. 

He urged that the President state a clear division between the two organizations on the 

human spaceflight mission.73 
As historians David N. Spires and Rick W. Sturdevant have pointed out, the MISS 

program became derailed within the Department of Defense at essentially the same time 

because of funding concerns and a lack of clear military mission: 

Throughout the spring and summer of 1958 the Air Force's Air Research 

and Development Command had mounted an aggressive campaign to have 

ARPA convince administration officials to approve its Man-in-SpaceSoonest development plan. But ARPA balked at the high cost, technical 

challenges, and uncertainties surrounding the future direction of the 

civilian space agency.74 

Dwight D. Eisenhower signed the National Aeronautics and Space Act of 1958 into law 

at the end of July and the next month assigned the Air Force's human spaceflight mission 

to NASA. Thereafter, the MISS program was folded into what became Project Mercury. 

By early November 1958, DOD had acceded to the President's desire that the human 

spaceflight program be a civilian effort under the management of NASA. For its part, 

NASA invited Air Force officials to appoint liaison personnel to the Mercury program 

office at Langley Research Center, and they did so.75 

Everyone recognized that time was of the essence in undertaking the human spaceflight 

project that NASA would now lead. Roy Johnson, director of ARPA for DOD, noted in 

September 1958 that competition with the Soviet Union precluded taking a cautious 

approach to the human spaceflight initiative and advocated additional funding to ensure 

its timely completion. As he wrote to the Secretary of Defense and the NASA 

administrator: 

I am troubled, however, with respect to one of the projects in which there 

is general agreement that it should be a joint undertaking. This is the socalled "Man-in-Space" project for which $10 million has been allocated to 

ARPA and $30 million to NASA. My concern over this project is due (1) 

to a firm conviction, backed by intelligence briefings, that the Soviets' 

next spectacular effort in space will be to orbit a human, and (2) that the 

amount of $40 million for FY 1959 is woefully inadequate to compete 

with the Russian program. As you know our best estimates (based on 

some 12–15 plans) were $100 to $150 million for an optimum FY 1959 

program. 

I am convinced that the military and psychological impact on the United 

States and its Allies of a successful Soviet man-inspace "first" program 

would be far reaching and of great consequence. 

Because of this deep conviction, I feel that no time should be lost in 

launching an aggressive Man-in-Space program and that we should be 

prepared if the situation warrants, to request supplemental appropriations 

of the Congress in January to pursue the program with the utmost 

urgency.76 
Johnson agreed to transfer a series of space projects from ARPA to NASA but urged 

more timely progress on development of the space vehicle itself. Two weeks later, ARPA 

and NASA established protocols for cooperating in the aggressive development of the 

capsule that would be used in the human spaceflight program.77 

To aid in the conduct of this program, ARPA and NASA created a panel for Manned 

Space Flight, also referred to as the Joint Manned Satellite Panel, on September 18, 1958. 

At its first meeting on September 24, the panel established goals and strategy for the 

program. Chaired by Robert Gilruth and including such NASA leaders as Max Faget and 

George Low, the panel focused on a wide range of technical requirements necessary to 

complete the effort. Under this panel's auspices, final specifications for the piloted 

capsule emerged in October 1958, as did procurement of both modified Redstone (for 

suborbital flights) and Atlas (for orbital missions) boosters.78 

Even while cooperating with NASA on Project Mercury, DOD remained committed to 

the eventual achievement of human spaceflight. It pursued several programs aimed in that 

direction. The first was the X–20 Dynasoar, a military spaceplane to be launched atop a 

Titan launcher—a narrow mission, to be sure. The Air Force believed that the X–20 

would provide a long-range bombardment and reconnaissance capability by flying at the 

edge of space and skipping off the Earth's atmosphere to reach targets anywhere in the 

world. The Air Force design for the Dynasoar project, which began on December 11, 

1961, required the Titan IIIC to launch its military orbital spaceplane.79 This winged, 

recoverable spacecraft did not possess as large a payload as NASA's capsule-type 

spacecraft and was always troubled by the absence of a clearly defined military mission. 

Accordingly, in September 1961, Defense Secretary Robert S. McNamara questioned 

whether Dynasoar represented the best expenditure of funds. This resulted in numerous 

studies of the program, but in 1963, McNamara canceled the program in favor of a 

Manned Orbiting Laboratory (MOL). This military space station, along with a modified 

capsule known as Gemini-B, would be launched into orbit aboard a Titan IIIM vehicle 

that used seven-segment solids and was human-rated. As an example of the seriousness 

with which the Air Force pursued the MOL program, the third Titan IIIC test flight 

boosted a prototype Gemini-B (previously used as GT–2 in the Gemini test program) and 

an aerodynamic mockup of the MOL laboratory into orbit. It was as close as MOL would 

come to reality. The new military space station plan ran into numerous technical and 

fiscal problems, and in June 1969, Secretary of Defense Melvin R. Laird informed 

Congress that MOL would be canceled.80 

Military space policy analyst Paul Stares summarized the fallout from the loss of the X–

20 and MOL programs upon the Air Force during the 1960s: 

With the cancellation of the Dynasoar and MOL, many believed in the Air 

Force that they had made their "pitch" and failed. This in turn reduced the 

incentives to try again and reinforced the bias towards the traditional 

mission of the Air Force, namely flying. As a result, the Air Force's space 

activities remained a poor relation to tactical and strategic airpower in its 

organizational hierarchy and inevitably in its funding priorities. This 
undoubtedly influenced the Air Force's negative attitude towards the 

various ASAT modernization proposals put forward by Air Defense 

Command and others in the early 1970s. The provision of satellite 

survivability measures also suffered because the Air Force was reluctant to 

propose initiatives that would require the use of its own budget to defend 

the space assets of other services and agencies.81 

This setback did not dissuade DOD from further attempts to enter the realm of human 

spaceflight, although the next effort involved persuading NASA to alter its space shuttle 

concept and to include a military mission in its planning scenarios. 

After Apollo, the human element of the U.S. civil space program went into a holding 

pattern for nearly a decade. During that time, it moved from its earlier heroic age to one 

characterized by more routine activities, perspectives, and processes; it was an 

institutionalizing of critical elements from a remarkably fertile heroic time.82 

The space shuttle became the sine qua non of NASA during the 1970s, intended as it was 

to make spaceflight routine, safe, and relatively inexpensive. Although NASA considered 

a variety of configurations, some of them quite exotic, it settled on a stage-and-a-half 

partially reusable vehicle with an approved development price tag of $5.15 billion. On 

January 5, 1972, President Richard Nixon announced the decision to build a space 

shuttle. He did so for both political reasons and national prestige purposes. Politically, it 

would help a lagging aerospace industry in key states he wanted to carry in the next 

election, especially California, Texas, and Florida.83 Supporters—especially Caspar 

Weinberger, who later became Reagan's defense secretary—argued that building the 

shuttle would reaffirm America's superpower status and help restore confidence, at home 

and abroad, in America's technological genius and will to succeed. This was purely an 

issue of national prestige.84 

The prestige factor belies a critical component. U.S. leaders supported the shuttle not on 

its merits but on the image it projected. In so doing, the space shuttle that emerged in the 

early 1970s was essentially a creature of compromise that consisted of three primary 

elements: a delta-winged orbiter spacecraft with a large crew compartment, a cargo bay 

15 by 60 feet in size, and three main engines; two solid rocket boosters; and an external 

fuel tank housing the liquid hydrogen and oxidizer burned in the main engines. The 

orbiter and the two solid rocket boosters were reusable. The shuttle was designed to 

transport approximately 45,000 tons of cargo into low Earth orbit, 115 to 250 statute 

miles above the Earth. It could also accommodate a flight crew of up to 10 persons 

(although a crew of 7 would be more common) for a basic space mission of 7 days. 

During a return to Earth, the orbiter was designed so that it had a cross-range 

maneuvering capability of 1,265 statute miles to meet requirements for liftoff and landing 

at the same location after only one orbit.85 

Many of those design modifications came directly from the Department of Defense; in 

return for DOD monetary and political support for the project, which might have not been 
approved otherwise, military astronauts would fly on classified missions in Earth orbit. 

Most of those missions were for the purpose of deploying reconnaissance satellites. 

The national security implications of the space shuttle decision must not be 

underestimated. Caspar Weinberger was key to the movement of the decision through the 

White House, and he believed the shuttle had obvious military uses and profound 

implications for national security. "I thought we could get substantial return" with the 

program, he said in a 1977 interview, "both from the point of view of national defense, 

and from the point of view [of] scientific advancement which would have a direct 

beneficial effect."86 He and others also impressed on the President the shuttle's potential 

for military missions. John Ehrlichman, Nixon's senior advisor for domestic affairs, even 

thought it might be useful to capture enemy satellites.87 The Soviets, who built the Buran 

in the 1980s and flew it without a crew only one time, pursued a shuttle project as a 

counterbalance to the U.S. program solely because they were convinced that the U.S. 

shuttle was developed for military purposes. As Russian space watcher James Oberg 

suggested: "They had actually studied the shuttle plans and figured it was designed for an 

out-of-plane bombing run over high-value Soviet targets. Brezhnev believed that and in 

1976 ordered $10 billion of expenditures. They had the Buran flying within ten years and 

discovered they couldn't do anything with it."88 

After a decade of development, on April 12, 1981, Columbia took off for the first orbital 

test mission. It was successful, and President Reagan declared the system "operational" in 

1982 after only its fourth flight. It would henceforth carry all U.S. Government payloads; 

military, scientific, and even commercial satellites could all be deployed from its payload 

bay.89 To prepare for this, in 1979, Air Force Secretary Hans Mark created the Manned 

Spaceflight Engineer program to "develop expertise in manned spaceflight and apply it to 

Department of Defense space missions." Between 1979 and 1986, this organization 

trained 32 Navy and Air Force officers as military astronauts.90 

Even so, the shuttle soon proved disappointing. By January 1986, there had been only 24 

shuttle flights, although in the 1970s NASA had projected more flights than that each 

year. Critical analyses agreed that the shuttle had proven to be neither cheap nor reliable, 

both primary selling points, and that NASA should never have used those arguments in 

building a political consensus for the program.91 All of these criticisms reached crescendo 

proportions following the loss of the Challenger during launch on January 28, 1986.92 A 

result of this was the removal from the shuttle of all commercial and national security 

payloads and the reinvigoration of the expendable launch vehicle production lines. It 

became another instance of DOD seeking a military human mission that eventually went 

awry. 

This quest for military astronauts did not end there. In the 1980s, DOD along with NASA 

began work on a single-stage-to-orbit (SSTO) vehicle for military purposes. If there is a 

holy grail of spaceflight, it is the desire for reusable SSTO technology—essentially a 

vehicle that can take off, fly into orbit, perform its mission, and return to Earth, landing 

like an airplane. This is an exceptionally difficult flight regime with a multitude of 

challenges relating to propulsion, materials, aerodynamics, and guidance and control. 
Fueled by the realization that the space shuttle could not deliver on its early expectations, 

DOD leaders pressed for the development of a hypersonic spaceplane. During the Reagan 

administration and its associated military buildup, Tony DuPont, head of DuPont 

Aerospace, offered an unsolicited proposal to the Defense Advanced Research Projects 

Agency (DARPA) to design a hypersonic vehicle powered by a hybrid integrated engine 

of scramjets and rockets. DARPA program manager Bob Williams liked the idea and 

funded it as a black program code-named COPPER CANYON between 1983 and 1985. 

The Reagan administration later unveiled it as the National Aero-Space Plane (NASP), 

designated the X–30. Reagan called it "a new Orient Express that could, by the end of the 

next decade, take off from Dulles Airport and accelerate up to twenty-five times the 

speed of sound, attaining low Earth orbit or flying to Tokyo within two hours."93 

The NASP program initially proposed to build two research craft, at least one of which 

should achieve orbit by flying in a single stage through the atmosphere at speeds up to 

Mach 25. The X–30 would use a multicycle engine that shifted from jet to ramjet and to 

scramjet speeds as the vehicle ascended burning liquid hydrogen fuel with oxygen 

scooped and frozen from the atmosphere.94 After billions of dollars were spent, NASP 

never progressed to flight stage. It finally died a merciful death, trapped as it was in 

bureaucratic politics and seemingly endless technological difficulty, in 1994.95 Thus fell 

another military astronaut program. 

Elements of DOD remain committed to this mission to the present. Throughout the 

1990s, a succession of studies argued for the potential of military personnel in space. One 

1992 study affirmed: 

It is absolutely essential for the well being of today's space forces as well 

as the future space forces of 2025, that DOD develop manned advanced 

technology space systems in lieu of or in addition to unmanned systems to 

effectively utilize military man's compelling and aggressive warfighting 

abilities to accomplish the critical wartime mission elements of space 

control and force application. National space policy, military space 

doctrine and common sense all dictate they should do so if space 

superiority during future, inevitable conflict with enemy space forces is 

the paramount objective. Deploying military man in space will provide 

that space superiority and he will finally become the "center of gravity" of 

the U.S. space program.96 

Another analysis found 37 reasons why military personnel in space would be required in 

the future, ranging from problem-solving and decisionmaking to manipulation of sensors 

and other systems. It concluded that "a military space plane could play a key role in 

helping the United States Air Force transform itself from an air force into an aerospace 

force."97 Yet another study found: "Our National Security Strategy must take full 

advantage of the full political, economic, and military power of this nation to be 

successful. That means soldiers, sailors and airmen able to operate in every region of the 

world critical to national security, whether it be on land, at sea, in the air, or in space. A 

strategy built on anything less is incomplete and shortsighted."98 Of course, if Aviation 
Week and Space Technology is to be believed, DOD not only wished for a military 

human mission in space but also developed a spaceplane named Blackstar and began 

flying missions as early as 1990.99 

It is obvious the decision made initially by Eisenhower to split the civil and military 

space programs and to assign the human mission to the civil side has been a bitter pill 

that remains difficult for DOD to swallow. It represents one instance among many in 

which a continuum between cooperation and competition has taken place in the 

interrelationships between the civil and military space programs. It is one of the many 

policy decisions made in the 1950s that may be overturned in the post– Cold War 

environment. 

Conclusion 

The fact that this survey of civil space history in relation to the national security arena has 

been oriented largely toward human spaceflight does not mean that other areas are 

insignificant in these interrelations— tracking and recovery, launch complexes and 

ranges, technology development, and a host of other issues come to mind—but the 

overwhelming amount of the funding spent on the civil space side has been for human 

spaceflight. Well over half of the NASA budget since the agency's creation has been 

expended on the human program, and therefore an emphasis on the part of the civil 

program appears appropriate. We have seen that there has been a long mating dance 

between the civil and military space programs over the years, and it appears that in the 

post–Cold War era, there may be a much closer relationship than was allowed earlier. 

In terms of lessons learned, what might spacepower analysts take from this discussion? 

First, spacepower possesses a major civil space, soft-power component that has been 

critical in the conduct of foreign policy during the last 50 years. It was a positive 

development in the winning of the Cold War, and the soft power element of spaceflight 

must be considered in the context of any policy issue. Second, there is so much overlap 

between the technology of civil and military spaceflight that it is critical that these two 

realms be kept as separate as possible. Finally, human spaceflight has long been a 

province of the civil space program in the United States, but the military has always 

wanted to become a part of it. There may well come a time when this becomes a reality, 

but probably not until humans have made their homes in space. 

As scientists and entrepreneurs spread into space, military personnel are likely to 

accompany them. Although the space frontier differs considerably from the American 

West, one aspect of the military role on the American frontier is worth remembering. For 

most of the time during the era of expansion, military personnel on the American frontier 

performed many tasks. They restrained lawless traders, pursued fugitives, ejected 

squatters, maintained order during peace negotiations, and guarded Indians who came to 

receive annuities. This was largely peaceful work, with the military catalyzing the 

processes of economic and social development. 
If humans develop a base on the Moon or even an outpost on Mars, the military may 

perform these duties once more. Remembering the role of the U.S. Corps of 

Topographical Engineers and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers in opening the American 

West, military leaders may propose the creation of a U.S. Corps of Space Engineers. The 

role they could play would be analogous to military activities in Antarctica. The U.S. 

Navy oversees the American station at McMurdo Sound and, every winter, the U.S. Air 

Force conducts a resupply airdrop at the South Pole station. Similar arrangements could 

take place on the Moon. Military personnel could construct and maintain an isolated lunar

outpost or a scientific station on the back side of the Moon. By providing support, 

military personnel would establish a presence in space and help secure national interests. 

This is a strikingly different perspective than what has been pursued militarily in space to 

date.

Notes

1. Solid overviews of the history of space exploration include William E. Burrows, This New Ocean: 

The Story of the First Space Age (New York: Random House, 1998); Howard E. McCurdy, Space 

and the American Imagination (Washington, DC: Smithsonian Institution Press, 1997); and Roger 

D. Launius, Frontiers of Space Exploration (Westport, CT: Greenwood Press, 1998). 

2. Dwayne A. Day, "Invitation to Struggle: The History of Civilian-Military Relations in Space," in 

Exploring the Unknown: Selected Documents in the History of the U.S. Civil Space Program, vol. 

II, External Relationships, ed. John M. Logsdon, Dwayne A. Day, and Roger D. Launius 

(Washington, DC: NASA SP–4407, 1996), 233. 

3. No better example of dual-use technology may be found than launch vehicles; almost all of those 

in the American inventory began as ballistic missiles developed to deliver nuclear weapons. On 

the history of this subject, see Roger D. Launius and Dennis R. Jenkins, eds., To Reach the High 

Frontier: A History of U.S. Launch Vehicles (Lexington: University Press of Kentucky, 2002). 

4. R. Cargill Hall, "Origins of U.S. Space Policy: Eisenhower, Open Skies, and Freedom of Space," 

in Exploring the Unknown: Selected Documents in the History of the U.S. Civil Space Program, 

vol. I, Organizing for Exploration, ed. John M. Logsdon and Linda J. Lear (Washington, DC: 

NASA, 1995), 222. 

5. Vernon Van Dyke, Pride and Power: The Rationale of the Space Program (Urbana: University of 

Illinois Press, 1964). 

6. John P. Lovell, review of Pride and Power: The Rationale of the Space Program, in Midwest 

Journal of Political Science 9 (February 1965), 119. 

7. This is the fundamental thesis of Van Dyke, Pride and Power; Derek Wesley Elliott, "Finding an 

Appropriate Commitment: Space Policy Development under Eisenhower and Kennedy, 1954–

1963," Ph.D. dissertation, George Washington University, 1992. It is also borne out in several 

essays contained in Roger D. Launius and Howard E. McCurdy, eds., Spaceflight and the Myth of 

Presidential Leadership (Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 1997), especially chapters 2, 3, 6, 

and 7. 

8. The best discussion of the evolution of space policy and the sorting of roles and missions for the 

various government entities remains John M. Logsdon, "The Evolution of U.S. Space Policy and 

Plans," in Logsdon and Lear, 377–393. See also Roger D. Launius, ed., Organizing for the Use of 

Space: Historical Perspectives on a Persistent Issue, vol. 18, AAS History Series (San Diego: 

Univelt, Inc., 1995); James R. Killian, Jr., Sputnik, Scientists, and Eisenhower: A Memoir of the 

First Special Assistant to the President for Science and Technology (Cambridge: MIT Press, 

1977); George B. Kistiakowsky, A Scientist in the White House (Cambridge: Harvard University 

Press, 1976); T. Keith Glennan, The Birth of NASA: The Diary of T. Keith Glennan, ed. J.D. 
Hunley (Washington, DC: NASA SP–4105, 1993); and Robert L. Rosholt, An Administrative 

History of NASA, 1958–1963 (Washington, DC: NASA SP–4101, 1966). 

9. On the grandiose visions of military personnel in space, see Wernher von Braun, "Crossing the 

Last Frontier," Collier's, March 22, 1952, 24–28, 72–73; Michael J. Neufeld, "'Space Superiority': 

Wernher von Braun's Campaign for a Nuclear-Armed Space Station, 1946–1956," Space Policy 22

(February 2006), 52–62; Curtis Peebles, High Frontier: The U.S. Air Force and the Military Space 

Program (Washington, DC: USAF History and Museums Program, 1997), 15–31; and Timothy D. 

Killebrew, "Military Man in Space: A History of Air Force Efforts to Find a Manned Space 

Mission," master's thesis, Air Command and Staff College, February 1987. 

10. On Sputnik, see these important works: Rip Bulkeley, The Sputnik Crisis and Early United States 

Space Policy: A Critique of the Historiography of Space (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 

1991); Robert A. Divine, The Sputnik Challenge: Eisenhower's Response to the Soviet Satellite 

(New York: Oxford University Press, 1993); and Paul Dickson, Sputnik: The Shock of the Century 

(New York: Walker and Company, 2001). 

11. On Apollo, see John M. Logsdon, The Decision to Go to the Moon: Project Apollo and the 

National Interest (Cambridge: MIT Press, 1970); Walter A. McDougall, . . . The Heavens and the 

Earth: A Political History of the Space Age (New York: Basic Books, 1985); Charles A. Murray 

and Catherine Bly Cox, Apollo, the Race to the Moon (New York: Simon and Schuster, 1989); and 

Andrew Chaikin, A Man on the Moon: The Voyages of the Apollo Astronauts (New York: Viking, 

1994). Good introductions to the history of planetary exploration may be found in Ronald A. 

Schorn, Planetary Astronomy: From Ancient Times to the Third Millennium (College Station: 

Texas A&M University Press, 1998). 

12. On the International Space Station, see Roger D. Launius, Space Stations: Base Camps to the 

Stars (Washington, DC: Smithsonian Institution Press, 2003). On the space shuttle, see Dennis R. 

Jenkins, Space Shuttle: The History of the National Space Transportation System, the First 100 

Missions, 3d ed. (Cape Canaveral, FL: Dennis R. Jenkins, 2001); T.A. Heppenheimer, The Space 

Shuttle Decision: NASA's Search for a Reusable Space Vehicle (Washington, DC: NASA SP–

4221, 1999); T.A. Heppenheimer, Development of the Space Shuttle, 1972–1981, vol. 2, History of 

the Space Shuttle (Washington, DC: Smithsonian Institution Press, 2002); and David M. Harland, 

The Story of the Space Shuttle (Chichester, UK: Springer-Praxis, 2004). 

13. This is an expression of Frederick Jackson Turner's "Frontier Thesis" that guided inquiry into 

much of American history for a generation. It also continues to inform many popular images of the 

American West. Turner outlined the major features of the subject in The Frontier in American 

History (New York: Holt, Rinehart, and Winston, 1920), which included the seminal 1893 essay, 

"The Significance of the Frontier in American History." 

14. This frontier imagery was overtly mythic. Myths, however, are important to the maintenance of 

any society, for they are stories that symbolize an overarching ideology and moral consciousness. 

As James Oliver Robertson observes in his book American Myth, American Reality (New York: 

Hill and Wang, 1980), xv, "Myths are the patterns of behavior, or belief, and/or perception—

which people have in common. Myths are not deliberately, or necessarily consciously, fictitious." 

Myth, therefore, is not so much a fable or falsehood, as it is a story, a kind of poetry, about events 

and situations that have great significance for the people involved. Myths are, in fact, essential 

truths for the members of a cultural group who hold them, enact them, or perceive them. They are 

sometimes expressed in narratives, but in literate societies like the United States, they are also apt 

to be embedded in ideologies. Robertson's book is one of many studies that focus on American 

myths—such as the myth of the chosen people, the myth of a God-given destiny, and the myth of a 

New World innocence or inherent virtue. 

15. This is the thesis of William Sims Bainbridge, The Spaceflight Revolution: A Sociological Study 

(New York: John Wiley and Sons, 1976). See also Willy Ley and Chesley Bonestell, The 

Conquest of Space (New York: Viking, 1949). 

16. George H. Gallup, The Gallup Poll: Public Opinion, 1935–1971 (New York: Random House, 

1972), 1:875, 1152. 

17. As an example of his exceptionally sophisticated spaceflight promoting, see Wernher von Braun, 

The Mars Project (Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 1953), based on a German-language series 

of articles appearing in the magazine Weltraumfahrt in 1952. 
18. "What Are We Waiting For?" Collier's, March 22, 1952, 23; Wernher von Braun with Cornelius 

Ryan, "Can We Get to Mars?" Collier's, April 30, 1954, 22–28; Randy L. Liebermann, "The 

Collier's and Disney Series," in Frederick I. Ordway III and Randy L. Liebermann, Blueprint for 

Space (Washington, DC: Smithsonian Institution Press, 1992), 141; and Ron Miller, "Days of 

Future Past," Omni, October 1986, 76–81. 

19. The dichotomy of visions has been one of the central components of the U.S. space program. 

Those who advocated a scientifically oriented program using nonpiloted probes and applications 

satellites for weather, communications, and a host of other useful activities were never able to 

capture the imagination of the American public the way the human spaceflight advocates did. For 

a modern critique of this dichotomy, see Alex Roland, "Barnstorming in Space: The Rise and Fall 

of the Romantic Era of Spaceflight, 1957–1986," in Space Policy Reconsidered, ed. Radford 

Byerly, Jr. (Boulder, CO: West-view Press, 1989), 33–52. That the human imperative is still 

consequential is demonstrated in William Sims Bainbridge's sociological study, Goals in Space: 

American Values and the Future of Technology (Albany: State University of New York Press, 

1991). 

20. "What Are We Waiting For?" 23. 

21. Elaine Tyler May, Homeward Bound: American Families in the Cold War Era (New York: Basic 

Books, 1988), 93–94, 104–113. 

22. See Roger D. Launius, John M. Logsdon, and Robert W. Smith, eds., Reconsidering Sputnik: 

Forty Years Since the Soviet Satellite (Amsterdam, The Netherlands: Harwood Academic 

Publishers, 2000). 

23. Roger D. Launius, "Eisenhower, Sputnik, and the Creation of NASA: Technological Elites and the 

Public Policy Agenda," Prologue: Quarterly of the National Archives and Records Administration 

28 (Summer 1996), 127–143; Roger D. Launius, "Space Program," in Dictionary of American 

History: Supplement, ed. Robert H. Ferrell and Joan Hoff (New York: Charles Scribner's Sons 

Reference Books, 1996), 2:221–223. 

24. See James A. Van Allen, Origins of Magnetospheric Physics (Washington, DC: Smithsonian 

Institution Press, 1983); and Matthew J. Von Benke, The Politics of Space: A History of U.S.-

Soviet/Russian Competition and Cooperation in Space (Boulder, CO: Westview Press, 1997). 

25. "National Aeronautics and Space Act of 1958," Public Law 85–568, 72 Stat., 426, Record Group 

255, National Archives and Records Administration, Washington, DC; and Alison Griffith, The 

National Aeronautics and Space Act: A Study of the Development of Public Policy (Washington, 

DC: PublicAffairs Press, 1962), 27–43. 

26. Roger D. Launius, NASA: A History of the U.S. Civil Space Program (Malabar, FL: Krieger 

Publishing Co., 1994), 29–41. 

27. The standard works on this subject are Asif A. Siddiqi, Challenge to Apollo: The Soviet Union and 

the Space Race, 1945–1974 (Washington, DC: NASA SP–2000–4408, 2000); and James J. 

Harford, Korolev: How One Man Masterminded the Soviet Drive to Beat America to the Moon 

(New York: John Wiley and Sons, 1997). 

28. Dwight D. Eisenhower, "Are We Headed in the Wrong Direction?" Saturday Evening Post, 

August 11, 1962, 24. 

29. Dwight D. Eisenhower, "Why I Am a Republican," Saturday Evening Post, April 11, 1964, 19. 

30. In addition to the above books on Apollo, see Edgar M. Cortright, ed., Apollo Expeditions to the 

Moon (Washington, DC: NASA SP–350, 1975); W. Henry Lambright, Powering Apollo: James E. 

Webb of NASA (Baltimore: The Johns Hopkins University Press, 1995); and David West 

Reynolds, Apollo: The Epic Journey to the Moon (New York: Harcourt, 2002). 

31. These observations are based on calculations using the budget data included in the annual 

Aeronautics and Space Report of the President, 2003 Activities (Washington, DC: NASA Report, 

2004), appendix E, which contains this information for each year since 1959; "National 

Aeronautics and Space Administration President's FY 2007 Budget Request," February 6, 2006, 

part I, NASA Historical Reference Collection, NASA History Division, NASA Headquarters, 

Washington, DC. 

32. Stephanie A. Roy, Elaine C. Gresham, and Carissa Bryce Christensen, "The Complex Fabric of 

Public Opinion on Space," IAF–99–P.3.05, presented at the International Astronautical Federation 

annual meeting, Amsterdam, The Netherlands, October 5, 1999. 
33. The Gallup Poll: Public Opinion, 1935–1971, part III: 1959–1971, 1952, 2183–2184, 2209; The 

New York Times, December 3, 1967; Newsweek is quoted in An Administrative History of NASA, 

chap. II, 48, NASA Historical Reference Collection. 

34. This analysis is based on a set of Gallup, Harris, NBC/Associated Press, CBS/New York Times, 

and ABC/USA Today polls conducted throughout the 1960s; copies are available in the NASA 

Historical Reference Collection. 

35. Roger D. Launius, "Kennedy's Space Policy Reconsidered: A Post–Cold War Perspective," Air 

Power History 50 (Winter 2003), 16–29. 

36. "Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons," March 5, 1970, available at <http:// 

disarmament.un.org/TreatyStatus.nsf>; "Missile Technology Control Regime," 1987, available at 

<www.mtcr.info/english/index.html>; and "Wassenaar Arrangement on Export Controls for 

Conventional Arms and Dual-Use Goods and Technologies," available at <www.wassenaar.org/>. 

37. A journalistic muckraking account of this story may be found in Bill Gertz, Betrayal: How the 

Clinton Administration Undermined American Security (Washington, DC: Regnery Publishing, 

Inc., 1999), which includes a useful collection of important government facsimile documents. 

38. Linda Neuman Ezell, NASA Historical Data Book, vol. II: Programs and Projects, 1958–1968 

(Washington, DC: NASA SP–4012, 1988), 61–67; and Richard P. Hallion, "The Development of 

American Launch Vehicles Since 1945," in Space Science Comes of Age: Perspectives in the 

History of the Space Sciences, ed. Paul A. Hanle and Von Del Chamberlain (Washington, DC: 

Smithsonian Institution Press, 1981), 126–127. 

39. Wernher von Braun, "The Redstone, Jupiter, and Juno," in The History of Rocket Technology, ed. 

Eugene M. Emme (Detroit: Wayne State University Press, 1964), 107–121. 

40. Richard E. Martin, The Atlas and Centaur "Steel Balloon" Tanks: A Legacy of Karel Bossart (San 

Diego: General Dynamics Corp., 1989); Robert L. Perry, "The Atlas, Thor, Titan, and 

Minuteman," in Emme, 143–155; and John L. Sloop, Liquid Hydrogen as a Propulsion Fuel, 

1945–1959 (Washington, DC: NASA SP–4404, 1978), 173–177. See also Edmund Beard, 

Developing the ICBM: A Study in Bureaucratic Politics (New York: Columbia University Press, 

1976); and Jacob Neufeld, Ballistic Missiles in the United States Air Force, 1945–1960 

(Washington, DC: Office of Air Force History, 1990). 

41. For able histories of the Atlas, see Dennis R. Jenkins, "Stage-and-a-Half: The Atlas Launch 

Vehicle," in Launius and Jenkins, eds., To Reach the High Frontier, 70–102; John Lonnquest, 

"The Face of Atlas: General Bernard Schriever and the Development of the Atlas Intercontinental 

Ballistic Missile, 1953–1960," Ph.D. dissertation, Duke University, 1996; and Davis Dyer, 

"Necessity is the Mother of Invention: Developing the ICBM, 1954–1958," Business and 

Economic History 22 (1993), 194–209. Although dated, a useful early essay is Robert L. Perry, 

"The Atlas, Thor, Titan, and Minuteman," in Emme, ed., History of Rocket Technology, 143–155. 

42. "Report of the Ad Hoc Mercury Panel," April 12, 1961, NASA Historical Reference Collection. 

43. James M. Grimwood and Ivan D. Ertal, "Project Gemini," Southwestern Historical Quarterly 81 

(January 1968), 393–418; James M. Grimwood, Barton C. Hacker, and Peter J. Vorzimmer, 

Project Gemini Technology and Operations (Washington, DC: NASA SP–4002, 1969); and 

Robert N. Lindley, "Discussing Gemini: A 'Flight' Interview with Robert Lindley of McDonnell," 

Flight International, March 24, 1966, 488–489. 

44. Despite the very real need to move beyond the ICBM technologies of the 1950s and 1960s, credit 

must be given to the utilization of these to develop a nascent space launch capability when only 

the Soviet Union had one elsewhere in the world. For instance, Europe, without an experience 

building early ballistic missiles, lost 20 years in the spacefaring age. Only when it successfully 

began launching the Ariane boosters in 1979 did it enter the space age in any serious way. 

45. Richard P. Hallion and James O. Young, "Space Shuttle: Fulfillment of a Dream," Case VIII of 

The Hypersonic Revolution: Case Studies in the History of Hypersonic Technology, vol. 1, From 

Max Valier to Project PRIME (1924–1967) (Washington, DC: U.S. Air Force History and 

Museums Program, 1998), 957–962; Spiro T. Agnew, The Post-Apollo Space Program: 

Directions for the Future (Washington, DC: Space Task Group, September 1969), reprinted in 

Logsdon, Exploring the Unknown, vol. I, Organizing for Exploration, 270–274. 

46. This was a powerful argument when made to the Europeans in 1971 and 1972—thereby assuring 

space access on an American launcher—and prompted them to sign up to a significant 

involvement in shuttle development. Only when the United States reneged on its offers of 
partnership did the European nations create the European Space Agency and embark on a launch 

vehicle of their own design, Ariane. See Roger D. Launius, "NASA, the Space Shuttle, and the 

Quest for Primacy in Space in an Era of Increasing International Competition," in L'Ambition 

Technologique: Naissance d'Ariane, ed. Emmanuel Chadeau (Paris: Institut d'Histoire de 

l'Industrie, 1995), 35–61. 

47. Hans Mark, The Space Station: A Personal Journey (Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 1987), 

61–65; Heppenheimer, Space Shuttle Decision, 275–280; and David M. Harland, The Space 

Shuttle: Roles, Missions and Accomplishments (Chichester, England: Praxis Publishing, Ltd., 

1998), 411–412. 

48. Few individuals have yet discussed the competing priorities that the shuttle was asked to fulfill. It 

seems truer as time passes, however, that the "one-size-fits-all" approach to technological 

challenges that the shuttle was asked to solve was unfair to the launch vehicle, the people who 

made it fly, and the organization that built and launched it. This would not be the first time in 

American history when such an approach had been used. The Air Force had been forced in the 

1960s to accept a combination fighter and bomber, the FB–111, against its recommendations. That 

airplane proved a disaster from start to finish. The individuals operating the space shuttle soldiered 

on as best they could to fulfill all expectations but the task was essentially impossible. See 

Michael F. Brown, Flying Blind: The Politics of the U.S. Strategic Bomber Program (Ithaca: 

Cornell University Press, 1992); and David S. Sorenson, The Politics of Strategic Aircraft 

Modernization (Westport, CT: Praeger, 1995). 

49. "NSDD–254," in Exploring the Unknown: Selected Documents in the History of the U.S. Civil 

Space Program, vol. IV, Accessing Space, ed. John M. Logsdon (Washington, DC: NASA SP–

4407, 1999), 382–485. 

50. John M. Logsdon and Craig Reed, "Commercializing Space Transportation," in Exploring the 

Unknown, vol. IV, 405–422. 

51. "Commercial Space Launch Act Amendments of 1988," in Exploring the Unknown, vol. IV, 458–

465. 

52. Isakowitz, Hopkins, and Hopkins, International Reference Guide to Space Launch Systems, 3d ed., 

passim. 

53. 53 Office of the President, National Security Presidential Directive 4, "National Space Launch 

Strategy," July 10, 1991, available at <http://fas.org/spp/military/docops/national/nspd4.htm>; 

William B. Scott, "ALS Cost, Efficiency to Depend Heavily on Process Improvements," Aviation 

Week and Space Technology, October 23, 1989, 41. 

54. This problem is discussed in some detail in Roger D. Launius, "After Columbia: The Space 

Shuttle Program and the Crisis in Space Access," Astropolitics 2 (July–September 2004), 277–

322; and John M. Logsdon, "'A Failure of National Leadership': Why No Replacement for the 

Space Shuttle?" in Critical Issues in the History of Spaceflight, ed. Steven J. Dick and Roger D. 

Launius (Washington, DC: NASA SP–2006–4702, 2006), 269–300. 

55. Project RAND, Douglas Aircraft Company's Engineering Division, Preliminary Design of an 

Experimental World-Circling Spaceship (SM–11827), May 2, 1946. 

56. The term was coined in Joseph S. Nye, Bound to Lead: The Changing Nature of American Power 

(New York: Basic Books, 1990). See also Joseph S. Nye, Soft Power: The Means to Success in 

World Politics (New York: PublicAffairs, 2004). 

57. Joseph S. Nye, "Propaganda Isn't the Way: Soft Power," The International Herald Tribune, 

January 10, 2003. 

58. "Russian 'Moon' Casts Big Shadow," Chicago Daily News, October 7, 1957. See also "Russia in 

Front," Chicago Tribune, October 6, 1957; and "The Good Side of a 'Bad' Moon," Chicago Daily 

News, October 8, 1957. 

59. Lyndon B. Johnson, The Vantage Point: Perspectives of the Presidency, 1963–1969 (New York: 

Holt, Rinehart, and Winston, 1971), 272. 

60. George E. Reedy to Lyndon B. Johnson, October 17, 1957, Lyndon B. Johnson Presidential 

Library, Austin, TX. 

61. Gallup polls, October 1, 1957, August 1, 1958, December 1, 1959, December 1, 1960, May 1,

1961, August 1, 1962, February 1, 1963, June 1, 1963, May 1, 1964, June 1, 1965, July 1, 1969, 

and May 1, 1971. 
62. Caspar W. Weinberger to President Richard M. Nixon, via George Shultz, "Future of NASA," 

August 12, 1971, White House, Richard M. Nixon, President, 1968–1971 File, NASA Historical 

Reference Collection. 

63. Kenneth Osgood, Total Cold War: Eisenhower's Secret Propaganda Battle at Home and Abroad 

(Lawrence: University Press of Kansas, 2006), 353. 

64. Greg Easterbrook, "The Space Shuttle Must Be Stopped," Time, February 2, 2003, available at 

<www.mercola.com/2003/feb/8/space_shuttle.htm>. 

65. I made this argument in relation to the space shuttle in two articles: "After Columbia: The Space 

Shuttle Program and the Crisis in Space Access," Astropolitics 2 (July–September 2004), 277–

322; and "Assessing the Legacy of the Space Shuttle," Space Policy 22 (November 2006), 226–

234. 

66. Von Braun, "Crossing the Last Frontier," 24–29, 72–74; and Launius, Space Stations, 26–35. 

67. The Man-in-Space-Soonest program called for a four-phase capsule orbital process, which would 

first use instruments, to be followed by primates, then a pilot, with the final objective of landing 

humans on the Moon. See David N. Spires, Beyond Horizons: A Half Century of Air Force Space 

Leadership (Peterson Air Force Base, CO: Air Force Space Command, 1997), 75; and Loyd S. 

Swenson, Jr., James M. Grimwood, and Charles C. Alexander, This New Ocean: A History of 

Project Mercury (Washington, DC: NASA SP–5201, 1966), 33–97. 

68. Swenson, Grimwood, and Alexander, 73–74. 

69. Lieutenant General Donald L. Putt, USAF, Deputy Chief of Staff, Development, to Hugh L. 

Dryden, NACA Director, January 31, 1958, Folder 18674, NASA Historical Reference Collection. 

70. NACA to USAF Deputy Chief of Staff, Development, "Transmittal of Copies of Proposed 

Memorandum of Understanding between Air Force and NACA for Joint NACA-Air Force Project 

for a Recoverable Manned Satellite Test Vehicle," April 11, 1958, Folder 18674, NASA Historical 

Reference Collection. 

71. The breakdown for this budget was aircraft and missiles, $32 million; support, $11.5 million; 

construction, $2.5 million; and research and development, $87 million. See Memorandum for 

ARPA Director, "Air Force Man-in-Space Program," March 19, 1958, Folder 18674, NASA 

Historical Reference Collection. 

72. Maurice H. Stans, Director, Bureau of the Budget, Memorandum for the President, "Responsibility 

for 'Space' Programs," May 10, 1958; Maxime A. Faget, NACA, Memorandum for Dr. Hugh L. 

Dryden, June 5, 1958; Clotaire Wood, Headquarters, NACA, Memorandum for files, "Tableing 

[sic] of Proposed Memorandum of Understanding Between Air Force and NACA For a Joint 

Project For a Recoverable Manned Satellite Test Vehicle," May 20, 1958, with attached 

Memorandum, "Principles for the Conduct by the NACA and the Air Force of a Joint Project for a 

Recoverable Manned Satellite Vehicle," April 29, 1958; and Donald A. Quarles, Secretary of 

Defense, to Maurice H. Stans, Director, Bureau of the Budget, April 1, 1958, Folder 18674, all in 

NASA Historical Reference Collection. 

73. Hugh L. Dryden, Director, NACA, Memorandum for James R. Killian, Jr., Special Assistant to the 

President for Science and Technology, "Manned Satellite Program," July 19, 1958, Folder 18674, 

NASA Historical Reference Collection. 

74. David N. Spires and Rick W. Sturdevant, "' . . . to the very limit of our ability . . . ': Reflections on 

Forty Years of Civil-Military Partnership in Space Launch," in To Reach the High Frontier: A 

History of U.S. Launch Vehicles, ed. Launius and Jenkins, 475. 

75. Memorandum for Dr. Abe Silverstein, "Assignment of Responsibility for ABMA Participation in 

NASA Manned Satellite Project," November 12, 1958; Abe Silverstein to Lt. Gen. Roscoe C. 

Wilson, USAF, Deputy Chief of Staff, Development, November 20, 1958; and Hugh L. Dryden, 

Deputy Administrator, NASA, Memorandum for Dr. Eugene Emme for NASA Historical Files, 

"The 'signed' Agreement of April 11, 1958, on a Recoverable Manned Satellite Test Vehicle," 

September 8, 1965, Folder 18674, all in NASA Historical Reference Collection. 

76. Roy W. Johnson, Director, ARPA, Department of Defense, Memorandum for the Administrator, 

NASA, "Man-in-Space Program," September 3, 1958, Folder 18674, NASA Historical Reference 

Collection. 

77. Roy W. Johnson, Director, ARPA, DOD, Memorandum for the Administrator, NASA, "ManinSpace Program," September 19, 1958, with attached Memorandum of Understanding, "Principles 
for the Conduct by NASA and ARPA of a Joint Program for a Manned Orbital Vehicle," 

September 19, 1958, Folder 18674, NASA Historical Reference Collection. 

78. Minutes of Meetings, Panel for Manned Space Flight, September 24, 30, October 1, 1958; NASA, 

"Preliminary Specifications for Manned Satellite Capsule," October 1958; and Paul E. Purser, 

Aeronautical Research Engineer, NASA, to Mr. R.R. Gilruth, NASA, "Procurement of Ballistic 

Missiles for Use as Boosters in NASA Research Leading to Manned Space Flight," October 8, 

1958, with attached, "Letter of Intent to AOMC (ABMA), Draft of Technical Content," October 8, 

1958, Folder 18674, all in NASA Historical Reference Collection. 

79. As the weight and complexity of Dynasoar grew, it quickly surpassed the capabilities of the Titan 

II and was switched to the Titan III. Just before the program was canceled, it looked like weight 

growth had outclassed even the Titan IIIC, and plans were being made to use Saturn IBs or other 

boosters. 

80. Roy F. Houchin III, "Air Force-Office of the Secretary of Defense Rivalry: The Pressure of 

Political Affairs in the Dyna-Soar (X–20) Program, 1957–1963," Journal of the British 

Interplanetary Society 50 (May 1997), 162–268; Matt Bacon, "The Dynasoar Extinction," Space 9 

(May 1993), 18–21; Roy F. Houchin III, "Why the Air Force Proposed the Dyna-Soar X–20 

Program," Quest: The History of Spaceflight Magazine 3, no. 4 (Winter 1994), 5–11; Terry Smith, 

"The Dyna-Soar X–20: A Historical Overview," Quest: The History of Spaceflight Magazine 3, 

no. 4 (Winter 1994), 13–18; Roy F. Houchin III, "Interagency Rivalry: NASA, the Air Force, and 

MOL," Quest: The History of Spaceflight Magazine 4, no. 4 (Winter 1995), 40–45; Donald Pealer, 

"Manned Orbiting Laboratory (MOL), Part 1," Quest: The History of Spaceflight Magazine 4, no. 

3 (Fall 1995), 4–17; Donald Pealer, "Manned Orbiting Laboratory (MOL), Part 2," Quest: The 

History of Spaceflight Magazine 4, no. 4 (Winter 1995), 28–37; and Donald Pealer, "Manned 

Orbiting Laboratory (MOL), Part 3," Quest: The History of Spaceflight Magazine 5, no. 2 (1996), 

16–23. 

81. Paul B. Stares, The Militarization of Space: U.S. Policy, 1945–1984 (Ithaca: Cornell University 

Press, 1985), 242. 

82. This is not at all unlike that analyzed by longshoreman philosopher Eric Hoffer. See Eric Hoffer, 

The True Believer: Thoughts on the Nature of Mass Movements (New York: Harper and Row, 

1951), 3–23, 137–155. See also Max Weber, "The Pure Types of Legitimate Authority," in Max 

Weber on Charisma and Institution Building: Selected Papers, ed. S.N. Eisenstadt (Chicago: 

University of Chicago Press, 1968), 46. 

83. George M. Low, NASA Deputy Administrator, Memorandum for the Record, "Meeting with the 

President on January 5, 1972," January 12, 1972, NASA Historical Reference Collection. The 

John Ehrlichman interview by John M. Logsdon, May 6, 1983, NASA Historical Reference 

Collection, emphasizes the political nature of the decision. This aspect of the issue was also 

brought home to Nixon by other factors such as letters and personal meetings. See Frank Kizis to 

Richard M. Nixon, March 12, 1971; Noble M. Melencamp, White House, to Frank Kizis, April 19, 

1971, both in Record Group 51, Series 69.1, Box 51–78–31, National Archives and Records 

Administration, Washington, DC. 

84. Caspar W. Weinberger, Memorandum for the President, via George Shultz, "Future of NASA," 

August 12, 1971, White House, Richard M. Nixon, President, 1968–1971 File, NASA Historical 

Reference Collection. 

85. Alfred C. Draper, Melvin L. Buck, and William H. Goesch, "A Delta Shuttle Orbiter," 

Astronautics and Aeronautics 9 (January 1971),26–35; Charles W.Mathews,"The Space Shuttle 

and Its Uses," Aeronautical Journal 76 (January 1972), 19–25; John M. Logsdon, "The Space 

Shuttle Program: A Policy Failure," Science 232 (May 30, 1986), 1099–1105; Scott Pace, 

"Engineering Design and Political Choice: The Space Shuttle, 1969–1972," master's thesis, 

Massachusetts Institute of Technology, May 1982; and Harry A. Scott, "Space Shuttle: A Case 

Study in Design," Astronautics and Aeronautics 17 (June 1979), 54–58. 

86. Caspar W. Weinberger, interview by John M. Logsdon, August 23, 1977, NASA History Division 

Reference Collection. 

87. Jacob E. Smart, NASA Assistant Administrator for DOD and Interagency Affairs, to James C. 

Fletcher, NASA Administrator, "Security Implications in National Space Program," December 1, 

1971, with attachments, James C. Fletcher Papers, Special Collections, Marriott Library, 

University of Utah, Salt Lake City; James C. Fletcher, NASA Administrator, to George M. Low, 
NASA Deputy Administrator, "Conversation with Al Haig," December 2, 1971, NASA History 

Division Reference Collection. 

88. James Oberg, "Toward a Theory of Space Power: Defining Principles for U.S. Space Policy," May 

20, 2003, 5, copy of paper in possession of author. 

89. The standard work on the shuttle and its operational history is Jenkins, Space Shuttle: The History 

of the National Space Transportation System, the First 100 Missions. 

90. USAF Fact Sheet 86–107, "Manned Spaceflight Engineer Program," 1986; Michael Cassutt, "The 

Manned Spaceflight Engineer Program," Spaceflight (January 1989), 32. 

91. Roger D. Launius, "The Space Shuttle—Twenty-five Years On: What Does It Mean to Have 

Reusable Access to Space?" Quest: The History of Spaceflight Magazine 13, no. 2 (2006), 4–20. 

92. By far the best work on the Challenger accident is Diane Vaughan, The Challenger Launch 

Decision: Risky Technology, Culture, and Deviance at NASA (Chicago: University of Chicago 

Press, 1996). 

93. Ronald Reagan, State of the Union Address, February 4, 1986. 

94. Larry E. Schweikart, "Command Innovation: Lessons from the National Aerospace Plane 

Program," in Innovation and the Development of Flight, ed. Roger D. Launius (College Station: 

Texas A&M University Press, 1999), 299–322. 

95. Carl H. Builder, "The NASP as a Time Machine," RAND Internal Note, August 1989, copy in 

possession of author; Roger Handberg and Joan Johnson-Freese, "NASP as an American Orphan: 

Bureaucratic Politics and the Development of Hypersonic Flight," Spaceflight 33 (April 1991), 

134–137; Larry E. Schweikart, "Hypersonic Hopes: Planning for NASP," Air Power History 41 

(Spring 1994), 36–48; Larry E. Schweikart, "Managing a Revolutionary Technology, American 

Style: The National Aerospace Plane," Essays in Business and Economic History 12 (1994), 118–

132; and Larry E. Schweikart, "Command Innovation: Lessons from the National Aerospace Plane 

Program," in Roger D. Launius, ed., Innovation and the Development of Flight (College Station: 

Texas A&M University Press, 1999), 299–323. 

96. Daniel L. Hansen, "Exploration of the Utility of Military Man in Space in the Year 2025," NASA 

report 1992STIN, 9318267H, March 1992. 

97. David M. Tobin, "Man's Place in Space-Plane Flight Operations: Cockpit, Cargo Bay, or Control 

Room?" Airpower Journal 13 (Fall 1999), 62. 

98. Joseph A. Carretto, Jr., "Military Man in Space: Essential to National Strategy," Executive 

Research Project, Industrial College of the Armed Forces, National Defense University, NDU–

ICAF–95– S3, April 1995, 47. 

99. William B. Scott, "USAF's Top Secret Two-Stage-to-Orbit Manned 'Blackstar' System," Aviation 

Week and Space Technology, March 5, 2006, available at 

<www.aviationnow.com/avnow/news/channel_awst_story.jsp?id=news/030606p1.xml>. 
Chapter 11:

Victory from Mars

Robert Zubrin

The discovery of America ultimately made the fortune of this island, transformed our 

situation in the world. . . . As America prospered and became more important, so did we.

. . . Within that community there is a natural shift of power and emphasis to the western 

side of the Atlantic. But already twice in our lifetime our country's existence has been 

assured by the preponderant partner. What sort of future could our small island expect 

looking out on a world riven between East and West, in the conflicts of giant land 

masses, without that assurance? . . . We owe this factor in our safety, the very condition 

of our lives, to the ambition and foresight, the enterprise and persistence, of our common 

ancestors, the Elizabethans.

—A.L. Rowse, The Elizabethans and America, 1959

The game of life is played not for money, but for children. The same is true of the contest 

of nations. Ultimately, victory can only be secured, and defined, by the generation of 

progeny.

In other chapters in this volume, authors have addressed the utility of space assets for 

pursuing military objectives such as support of communications, navigation, 

reconnaissance, missile or aircraft interception, or strike. Although the importance of 

such tactical applications of space technology for achieving superiority on the terrestrial 

battlefield can in no way be disparaged, this chapter considers the significance of the 

space endeavor and space itself with respect to the central strategic goal of securing 

ultimate victory for the American cause. 

To use a naval analogy, the battlefield advantages offered by space technology compare 

to the application of superior seapower for such purposes as shore bombardment or closein port blockade, both of which were of some utility to Britain in various European 

conflicts during its age of naval dominance. In contrast, the purposes addressed in this 

chapter compare to those by which the British took advantage of their maritime capacity 

to expand their language, culture, values, and society across the globe. 

Anticipating the conflicts to come, a prescient late 19th-century writer once drew a 

pointed comparison between the strategic thinking styles of the contending European 

elites.1 The German General Staff, he observed, calculated their wars with regard to 

fortresses and railway schedules. The British, however, laid their plans in terms of 

"continents and centuries," and by virtue of this broader strategic grasp, would always 

ultimately defeat their more mentally limited opponents. Looking back today on both the 
course and outcomes of the two major wars of the 20th century, one cannot but be 

forcefully impressed by the penetrating nature of his assessment. 

"Fortresses and railway schedules," or their modern-day equivalents, certainly have a 

place in military thinking. But if a nation is to prevail over the long haul, those entrusted 

with its fate must also consider matters of "continents and centuries." This is the central 

truth that must guide U.S. space policy if it is to be formulated adequately.

In the mid-1500s, at the time of accession of Queen Elizabeth I, England was a very 

minor power, insignificant in comparison with Spain, France, Poland, Austria, or the 

Ottoman Empire, inferior in significance even to Portugal or Venice. But as a result of 

the vision of leaders like Richard Hakluyt, Walter Raleigh, Humphrey Gilbert, and 

Elizabeth herself, a set of policy decisions was made and implemented at great cost and 

sacrifice to challenge Spain upon the high seas and thus make possible the creation of a 

new England on the other side of the Atlantic. If not for that and the colonization 

initiatives that followed, the individualistic humanist culture that Tudor England was in 

seed form would not have propagated to become the basis of advanced global society 

today. Indeed, if not for that, William Shakespeare, the Magna Carta, the Common Law, 

trial by jury, and other portentous aspects of Tudor society would today be mere 

historical footnotes, of no greater interest to the present age than the literature and culture 

of late medieval Croatia. If not for that, no one in the present age would likely be 

discoursing on space strategy at all.

In considering the success of the British program of overseas colonization in 

transforming both the English polity and English culture from insignificance to world 

dominance, it is useful to compare it not only with the policies of nonplaying 

contemporary great powers such as Turkey and Poland, but also to apparent colonizers 

such as Spain and France. While in retrospect it is clear enough that those powers that 

chose to obsess over affairs internal to the European arena while ignoring the continents 

to be won elsewhere were writing themselves out of the future, the difference in overseas 

colonization policies between those powers that did venture abroad is not as obvious. 

However, upon closer inspection, a dramatic difference between the overseas ventures of 

England and those of its transoceanic competitors emerges. Specifically, while Spain, 

France, Portugal, and Holland (as well as England) all set up overseas outposts for the 

purpose of extracting profits for the benefit of investors in Europe, only the English also 

set about seriously creating daughter countries, true new branches of English civilization. 

The Spanish sent conquistadors to Mexico and Peru to rule over natives enslaved to mine 

gold or silver, while the French sent adventurous traders to network with Canadian Indian 

tribes to obtain valuable fur pelts. However, the English sent families of settlers abroad to 

build farms, towns, universities, legislatures, and ultimately cities and nations. As a 

result, despite the fact that the population of the France of Louis XIV was four times that 

of contemporary England, by 1750 there were 2 million English-speaking people in 

North America but only 50,000 French. It was thus that the future of this continent and, 

to a significant degree, this planet, was decided. 
But what about the rest of the planets? The Earth is not the only world. In the vast 

reaches of space, there are myriad others. The true prize in the great game is not the 

Persian Gulf, but the universe. The nation that first reaches out to colonize it is the one 

that will put its stamp upon the future. 

Our New World 

Among extraterrestrial bodies in our solar system, Mars is singular in that it possesses all 

the raw materials required to support not only life, but also a new branch of human 

civilization. This uniqueness is illustrated most clearly if Mars is contrasted with the 

Earth's Moon, the most frequently cited alternative location for extraterrestrial human 

colonization.

Unlike the Moon, Mars is rich in carbon, nitrogen, hydrogen, and oxygen, all in 

biologically readily accessible forms such as carbon dioxide gas, nitrogen gas, water ice, 

and permafrost.2 Carbon, nitrogen, and hydrogen are only present on the Moon in parts 

per million quantities. Oxygen is abundant on the Moon, but only in tightly bound oxides 

such as silicon dioxide, ferrous oxide, magnesium oxide, and alumina oxide, which 

require very high-energy processes to reduce.3 Current knowledge indicates that if Mars 

were smooth and all its ice and permafrost melted into liquid water, the entire planet 

would be covered with an ocean over 200 meters deep.4 This scenario contrasts strongly 

with the Moon, which is so dry that if concrete were found there, lunar colonists would 

mine it to get the water out. Thus, if plants could be grown in greenhouses on the Moon 

(an unlikely proposition, as the Moon's 2-week-long dark spell is unsuitable for most 

plants, and the absence of any atmosphere would make necessary very thick glass for 

solar flare shielding), most of their biomass material would have to be imported.

The Moon is also deficient in about half the metals of interest to industrial society 

(copper, for example), as well as many other elements of interest such as sulfur and 

phosphorus. Mars has every required element in abundance. Moreover, on Mars, as on 

Earth, hydrologic and volcanic processes have occurred that are likely to have 

consolidated various elements into local concentrations of high-grade mineral ore. 

Indeed, the geologic history of Mars has been compared to that of Africa, with very 

optimistic inferences as to its mineral wealth implied as a corollary.5 In contrast, the 

Moon has almost no history of water or volcanic action, with the result that it is basically 

composed of trash rocks with little differentiation into ores that represent useful 

concentrations of anything interesting.

Power could be generated on either the Moon or Mars with solar panels, and here the 

advantages of the Moon's clearer skies and closer proximity to the Sun than Mars roughly 

balance the disadvantage of large energy storage requirements created by the Moon's 28-

day light/dark cycle. But if the desire was to manufacture solar panels so as to create a 

self-expanding power base, Mars holds an enormous advantage, as only Mars possesses 

the large supplies of carbon and hydrogen needed to produce the pure silicon required for 

making photovoltaic panels and other electronics. Also, there is no geologically purified 

source of silicon dioxide, such as sand, on the Moon. In addition, Mars has the potential 
for wind-generated power, while the Moon clearly does not. But both the Sun and wind 

offer relatively modest power potential—tens or at most hundreds of kilowatts here or 

there. To create a vibrant civilization, a richer power base is needed, and Mars has this 

both in the short and medium term in the form of its geothermal power resources, which 

offer the potential for large numbers of locally created electricity-generating stations in 

the 10 megawatt (10,000 kilowatt) class. In the long term, Mars will enjoy a power-rich 

economy based upon exploitation of its large domestic resources of deuterium fuel for 

fusion reactors. Deuterium is five times more common on Mars than it is on Earth, and 

tens of thousands of times more common on Mars than on the Moon.6

But the biggest problem with the Moon, as with all other airless planetary bodies and 

proposed artificial free-space colonies, is that sunlight is not available in a form useful for 

growing crops. A single acre of plants on Earth requires 4 megawatts (MW) of sunlight 

power; a square kilometer needs 1,000 MW. The entire world put together would not 

produce enough electric power to illuminate the farms of the state of Rhode Island. 

Growing crops with electrically generated light is economically hopeless. But natural 

sunlight cannot be used on the Moon or any other airless body in space unless the walls 

on the greenhouse are thick enough to shield out solar flares, a requirement that 

enormously increases the expense of creating crop land. Even accomplishing this 

requirement would do no good on the Moon, because plants will not grow in a light/dark 

cycle lasting 28 days.

But Mars has an atmosphere thick enough to protect crops grown on the surface from 

solar flares. Therefore, thin-walled inflatable plastic greenhouses protected by 

unpressurized ultraviolet-resistant hard-plastic shield domes can be used to rapidly create 

crop land on the surface. Even without the problems of solar flares and a month-long 

diurnal cycle, such simple greenhouses would be impractical on the Moon as they would 

create unbearably high temperatures. On Mars, in contrast, the strong greenhouse effect 

created by such domes would be precisely what is necessary to produce a temperate 

climate inside. Such domes up to 50 meters in diameter are light enough to be transported 

from Earth initially, and they eventually could be manufactured on Mars out of 

indigenous materials. Because all the resources to make plastics exist on Mars, networks 

of such 50- to 100-meter domes could be manufactured and deployed rapidly, opening up 

large areas of the surface to both shirtsleeve human habitation and agriculture. Looking 

further into the future, it will eventually be possible for humans to thicken Mars' 

atmosphere substantially by forcing the regolith to outgas its contents through a 

deliberate program of artificially induced global warming. Once that has been 

accomplished, the habitation domes could be almost any size, as they would not have to 

sustain a pressure differential between their interior and exterior. In fact, once that has 

been done, it will be possible to raise specially bred crops outside the domes.

The point is that unlike colonists on any other known extraterrestrial body, Martian 

colonists will be able to live on the surface, not in tunnels, and move about freely and 

grow crops in the light of day. Mars is a place where humans can live and multiply to 

large numbers, supporting themselves with products of every description made out of 

indigenous materials. Mars is thus a place where an actual civilization, not just a mining 
or scientific outpost, can be developed. And it is this civilization, grown in size and 

technological potency on a frontier planet with a surface area as large as all the continents 

of Earth put together, that will both radically tip the balance among those who remain 

behind on Earth and provide the pioneers with the craft and outlook required to push the 

human reach much further.

Thus, for our generation and those soon to follow, Mars is the new world. The nation that 

settles it is one whose culture, values, social forms, and ideas will provide the point of 

departure for the further development of human civilization as our species expands 

outward from its planet of origin to the innumerable others awaiting us in the infinite 

reaches of space.

The central strategic imperative of American space policy can thus be summarized in two 

words: colonize Mars.

The Question of Means 

Some have said that sending humans to Mars is a venture for the far future. Such a point 

of view has no basis in fact. On the contrary, such a program is entirely achievable.7

From the technological point of view, we are ready. Despite the greater distance to Mars, 

we are much better prepared today to send humans to Mars than we were to launch 

humans to the Moon in 1961 when John F. Kennedy challenged the Nation to achieve 

that goal—and we were there 8 years later. Given the will, we could have our first teams 

on Mars within a decade.

The key to success will be to reject the policy of continued stagnation represented by 

shuttle-era thinking and return to the destination-driven Apollo method of planned 

operation that allowed the space agency to perform so brilliantly during its youth. In 

addition, we must take a lesson from our own pioneer past and adopt a "travel light and 

live off the land" mission strategy similar to the type that well served terrestrial explorers 

for centuries. The plan to explore the Red Planet in this way is known as Mars Direct (see 

figure 11–1). First, an unfueled Earth Return Vehicle (ERV) would be delivered to Mars, 

where it would manufacture its propellant from the Martian atmosphere. The crew then 

would fly to Mars in a tuna-can-shaped habitation module, which would also provide 

living quarters, a laboratory, and a workshop for a 11⁄2-year Mars stay.
Figure 11–1. Artist concept of the Mars Direct plan.

Source: Robert Murray, Pioneer Astronautics

At an early launch opportunity—for example, 2014—a single heavy lift booster with a 

capability equal to that of the Saturn V used during the Apollo program is launched off 

Cape Canaveral and uses its upper stage to throw a 40-ton unmanned payload onto a 

trajectory to Mars. (Such a booster could be readily created by converting the shuttle 

launch stack, by deleting the Orbiter and replacing it with a payload fairing containing a 

hydrogen/oxygen rocket stage.) Upon arrival at Mars 8 months later, the spacecraft uses 

friction between its aeroshield and Mars' atmosphere to brake itself into orbit around the 

planet and then lands with the help of a parachute. This payload is the ERV. It flies out to 

Mars with its two methane/oxygen-driven rocket propulsion stages unfueled. It also 

carries 6 tons of liquid hydrogen cargo, a 100-kilowatt nuclear reactor mounted in the 

back of a methane/oxygen-driven light truck, a small set of compressors and an 

automated chemical processing unit, and a few small scientific rovers.

As soon as the craft lands successfully, the truck is telerobotically driven a few hundred 

meters away from the site, and the reactor is deployed to provide power to the 

compressors and chemical processing unit. The hydrogen brought from Earth can be 

quickly reacted with the Martian atmosphere, which is 95 percent carbon dioxide gas 

(CO2), to produce methane and water, thus eliminating the need for long-term storage of 
cryogenic hydrogen on the planet's surface. The methane so produced is liquefied and 

stored, while the water is electrolyzed to produce oxygen, which is stored, and hydrogen, 

which is recycled through the methanator. Ultimately, these two reactions (methanation 

and water electrolysis) produce 24 tons of methane and 48 tons of oxygen. Since this is 

not enough oxygen to burn the methane at its optimal mixture ratio, an additional 36 tons 

of oxygen is produced via direct dissociation of Martian CO2. The entire process takes 10 

months, at the conclusion of which a total of 108 tons of methane/oxygen bipropellant 

will have been generated. This represents a leverage of 18:1 of Martian propellant 

produced compared to the hydrogen brought from Earth needed to create it. Ninety-six 

tons of the bipropellant will be used to fuel the ERV, while 12 tons are available to 

support the use of high-powered, chemically fueled long-range ground vehicles. Large 

additional stockpiles of oxygen can also be produced, both for breathing and for turning 

into water by combination with hydrogen brought from Earth. Since water is 89 percent 

oxygen (by weight), and since the larger part of most foodstuffs is water, this greatly 

reduces the amount of life support consumables that need to be hauled from Earth.

The propellant production having been successfully completed, in 2016 two more 

boosters lift off and throw their 40-ton payloads toward Mars. One of the payloads is an 

unmanned fuel-factory/ERV just like the one launched in 2014; the other is a habitation 

module carrying a crew of four, a mixture of whole food and dehydrated provisions 

sufficient for 3 years, and a pressurized methane/oxygen-powered ground rover. On the 

way to Mars, artificial gravity can be provided to the crew by extending a tether between 

the habitat and the burnt-out booster upper stage and spinning the assembly.

Upon arrival, the manned craft drops the tether, aerobrakes, and lands at the 2014 landing 

site, where a fully fueled ERV and fully characterized and beaconed landing site await it. 

With the help of such navigational aids, the crew should be able to land right on the spot. 

However, if the landing is off course by tens or even hundreds of kilometers, the crew 

can still achieve the surface rendezvous by driving over in their rover. If they are off by 

thousands of kilometers, the second ERV provides a backup.

However, assuming the crew lands and rendezvous as planned at site number one, the 

second ERV will land several hundred kilometers away to start making propellant for the 

2018 mission, which in turn will fly out with an additional ERV to open up Mars landing 

site number three. Thus, every other year, two heavy-lift boosters are launched—one to 

land a crew, and the other to prepare a site for the next mission—for an average launch 

rate of just one booster per year to pursue a continuing program of Mars exploration. 

Since in a normal year, we can launch about six shuttle stacks, this would only represent 

about 16 percent of the U.S. launch capability and would clearly be affordable. In effect, 

this "live off the land" approach removes the manned Mars mission from the realm of 

mega-spacecraft fantasy and reduces it in practice to a task of comparable difficulty to 

that faced in launching the Apollo missions to the Moon. 

The crew will stay on the surface for 11⁄2 years, taking advantage of the mobility afforded 

by the high-powered, chemically driven ground vehicles to accomplish a great deal of 

surface exploration. With a 12-ton surface fuel stockpile, they have the capability for 
over 24,000 kilometers worth of traverse before they leave, giving them the kind of 

mobility necessary to conduct a serious search for evidence of past or present life on 

Mars—an investigation key to revealing whether life is a phenomenon unique to Earth. 

Since no one has been left in orbit, the entire crew will have available to them the natural 

gravity and protection against cosmic rays and solar radiation afforded by the Martian 

environment, and thus there will not be the strong driver for a quick return to Earth that 

plagues alternative Mars mission plans based upon orbiting mother ships with small 

landing parties. At the conclusion of their stay, the crew returns to Earth in a direct flight 

from the Martian surface in the ERV. As the series of missions progresses, a string of 

small bases will be left behind on the Martian surface, opening up broad stretches of 

territory to human cognizance.

In essence, by taking advantage of the most obvious local resource available on Mars—

its atmosphere—the plan allows accomplishment of a manned Mars mission with what 

amounts to a lunar-class transportation system. By eliminating any requirement to 

introduce a new order of technology and complexity of operations beyond those needed 

for lunar transportation to accomplish piloted Mars missions, the plan can reduce costs by 

an order of magnitude and advance the schedule for the human exploration of Mars by a 

generation. 

Exploring Mars requires no miraculous new technologies, no orbiting spaceports, and no 

gigantic interplanetary space cruisers. We do not need to spend the next 30 years with a 

space program mired in impotence, spending large sums of money, and taking occasional 

casualties while the same missions to nowhere are flown over and over again and 

professional technologists dawdle endlessly without producing any new flight hardware. 

We simply need to choose our destination and, with the same combination of vision, 

practical thinking, and passionate resolve that served us so well during Apollo, do what is 

required to get there.

We can establish our first small outpost on Mars within a decade. We and not some 

future generation can have the eternal honor of being the first pioneers of this new world 

for humanity. All that is needed is present-day technology, some 19th-century industrial 

chemistry, a solid dose of common sense, and a little bit of moxie.

The Question of Morale 

Of the requirements for a successful Mars program, it is the moxie that currently seems 

hardest to come by. NASA recently made what was intended to be a grand announcement 

that it was setting its sights on returning astronauts to the Moon by 2020—just a bit over 

half a century after Americans landed there the first time. NASA gave various reasons for 

its Moonbase plan, none of which made any sense. The stated scientific goals were trivial 

compared to those that could be addressed on Mars, and due to its extreme poverty of 

resources, the Moon is a very poor candidate for human settlement. NASA's claim that 

nevertheless, the Moon might be a good place to practice space exploration and 

settlement in preparation for going to Mars (where such activities might actually be 

possible) was risible. Practice for Mars missions could be done for a tiny fraction of the 
cost (or three orders of magnitude more practice could be accomplished for the same 

cost) in the Arctic, so NASA clearly is not aiming for the Moon in order to practice for 

Mars. On the contrary, the primary purpose of the Moon program appears to be to give 

NASA a driving programmatic goal that does not require embracing the challenge of 

Mars. Indeed, given the lengthy schedule to the first return landing as advertised for the 

lunar program (roughly twice as long as it took NASA to accomplish the same feat 

during the age of slide rules and rotary telephones), one may question whether the current 

NASA lunar program even includes a willingness to take on the challenge of going to the 

Moon.8Rather, like President George W. Bush's announcement of a plan to balance the 

Federal budget by 2012 (that is, 4 years after he left office), it seems more like a 

recommendation that somebody else should take on the responsibility of acting bravely.

The question of the reassertion of the American spirit thus emerges as the critical variable 

that will determine victory or defeat for our nation. How can the space program 

contribute toward that end? Certainly not by choosing timid goals. Our military space 

activities can do much to assist national defense, but what we really need is a space 

program that makes it clear to all that ours is a nation that is truly worth defending.

In September 1962, even as the United States headed toward a decisive confrontation 

with the Soviet Union in the Cuban missile crisis, President John F. Kennedy gave a 

speech concerning space policy at Rice University: 

We choose to go to the Moon! We choose to go to the Moon in this decade 

and do the other things, not because they are easy but because they are 

hard, because that goal will serve to organize and measure the best of our 

energies and skills, because that challenge is one that we are willing to 

accept, one we are unwilling to postpone, and one which we intend to win. 

. . . This is in some measures an act of faith and vision, for we do not 

know what benefits await us. . . . But space is there and we are going to 

climb it.

That is the spirit that built this nation, won the West, achieved our victories, and really 

got us to the Moon. It is the spirit we desperately need to find again today. But if we are 

to be as great a people as we once were, we need to act as we once did. For the present 

age, that means choosing to accept the challenge of Mars. A humans-to-Mars program 

would be a direct reassertion of the American pioneer spirit. It also would be a profound 

statement that we, both as a species and as a nation, are living not at the end of our 

history, but at the beginning of our history—that we choose to continue to be a people 

whose great deeds will be reported in newspapers, and not just in museums. It is by 

making and honoring that statement that we will create the means for victory, both now 

and for ages to come. 

Notes
1. The writer in question was Karl Marx. While he may have been incompetent as a designer of 

economic systems, as a journalistic observer of contemporary political events he was frequently 

very astute.

2. Michael H. Carr, The Surface of Mars (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1981).

3. Michael H. Carr, Water on Mars (New York: Oxford University Press, 1996).

4. Grant Heiken, David Vaniman, and Bevan M. French, eds., Lunar Sourcebook: A User's Guide to 

the Moon (Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 1991).

5. Bruce M. Cordell, "A Preliminary Assessment of Martian Natural Resource Potential," in The 

Case for Mars II, ed. C.P. McKay, AAS Science and Technology Series, vol. 62 (San Diego: 

Univelt Publishers, 1985).

6. Tobias Owen, Jean Pierre Maillard, Catherine de Bergh, and Barry Lutz, "Deuterium on Mars: 

The Abundance of HDO and the Value of D/H," Science 24, no. 4860 (June 24, 1988), 1767.

7. For details, see Robert Zubrin with Richard Wagner, The Case for Mars: The Plan to Settle the 

Red Planet and Why We Must (New York: The Free Press, 1996).

8. Robert Zubrin, "Getting Space Exploration Right," The New Atlantis, no. 8 (Spring 2005).
Chapter 12:

The Moon: Point of Entry to Cislunar Space

Paul D. Spudis

If God wanted man to become a space-faring species, 

He would have given man a Moon.

— Krafft Ehricke1

One can imagine many possible missions and destinations for America's civil space 

program.Voyages to the planets, large scientific instruments at orbital libration points, 

and continued use of the International Space Station (ISS) are all possible missions of 

both machines and people from many countries in the coming decades.With the imminent 

completion of the ISS and retirement of the space shuttle, a national discussion has 

emerged as to both the purpose and rationale for human spaceflight.

The Vision for Space Exploration (VSE) outlined by President George W. Bush in 20042

and endorsed by Congress in 20053 and 20084 (under different parties) called for human 

missions beyond low Earth orbit (LEO), including a return to the Moon.The inclusion of 

the Moon has drawn comment from the space community, many of whom think that 

since the Apollo program ended over three decades ago, it was included as a way to 

regain valuable experience.In fact, the Moon is the critical element of the VSE.It is where 

we will learn how to use what we find in space to create new spacefaring capability.

Why the Moon? 

The Moon has a major advantage over other potential destinations beyond LEO as it is 

both close and easily accessible.Only a 3-day trip from Earth, the Moon is close enough 

for existing space systems to reach.Additionally, it is only a 3-light-second round trip 

between Earth and Moon, which allows robotic missions on the lunar surface to be 

controlled remotely from the Earth in near real time.The Moon's low gravity permits 

landing and operations with a minimal expenditure of energy.

The Moon is a scientific laboratory of unique character.Its location near Earth ensures 

that it records the geological history of this part of the solar system.Such history includes 

the impact of solid objects and the solar wind and their possible changes with time.It 

holds a historical record of cosmic radiation, including nearby supernovae. The Moon's 

timeless surface preserves a record of ancient events, and whatever is preserved on the 

lunar surface must have also affected the Earth.This record is long gone from our 

dynamic terrestrial surface but remains preserved on the static, ancient lunar surface. 
The Moon has the material and energy resources needed to support human presence and 

to begin building a long-lasting transportation infrastructure.Its surface is covered by a 

very fine-grained soil that is useful as radiation shielding and building material.5Oxygen 

extracted from lunar materials can support life and be used for rocket propellant.Light 

elements, such as hydrogen, helium, and nitrogen, are present in the lunar soil in low 

concentrations, but in enough quantity to permit their extraction and use.More 

importantly, we now find that significant amounts of hydrogen are present in soils at high 

latitudes and that the polar areas may contain water ice in permanently dark 

areas.Because the spin axis of the Moon is nearly perpendicular to its orbit around the 

Sun, some areas at the poles are in near-permanent sunlight.This is a unique asset: areas 

in constant sunlight for power generation are proximate to shadowed terrain enriched in 

the light elements, such as hydrogen.Another asset unique to the Moon is its far side, the 

only place in our solar system permanently shielded from Earth's radio noise.Here we can 

scan the sky to observe the universe in entirely new areas of the spectrum.

The Moon is the first, but not the last, destination in the VSE.It is not only an important 

destination in its own right, but also an enabling asset.The objective of this program is to 

go to the Moon to learn how to use off-planet resources to create new capability and to 

make future space flight easier and cheaper.6Rocket propellant made on the Moon 

permits routine access to cislunar space by both people and machines, and is vital to the 

servicing and protection of national strategic assets and for the repair and refurbishing of 

commercial satellites.The United States cannot afford to forfeit its lead in the access of 

cislunar space.There are serious national security and economic ramifications if our 

leaders fail to recognize the importance of the Moon to our future in space and here on 

Earth.

Spaceflight: The Current Template 

Fifty years of space travel have been possible because we accepted the iron rules of 

spaceflight that are dictated by the rocket equation.7In brief, this requires a significant 

expenditure of energy to get something out of the deep gravity well in which the Earth 

resides.As it is very expensive to escape this gravity field, the things we launch into space 

are made as small and low in mass as possible.As long as this mode of operation prevails, 

we are mass- and power-limited in space and therefore, capability-limited.These 

limitations greatly restrict what we can do in space.

The prevailing rules of spaceflight have led to the development of a template of 

operations for satellites and other space assets.For a given mission, a specialized, usually 

custom, spacecraft is designed.The spacecraft is built to exceedingly fine standards, with 

numerous environmental tests and retests.It is launched on an expendable vehicle into a 

specially designed orbit and in most cases is unreachable by other spacecraft.If all goes 

well, it is operated for as long as possible and ultimately abandoned.The entire process is 

then repeated.Sometimes, by incorporating the results from previous missions, the design 

is improved.
Because each satellite is eventually thrown away, space operations are expensive and 

difficult.If it were possible, these assets would benefit greatly from servicing, 

maintenance, and expansion.A system that routinely accesses orbiting satellites with 

servicing robots and people would fundamentally change our approach to spaceflight.The 

difficulty in developing this capability is that the machines and propellant we would need 

to do this must also be lifted up from the deep gravity well, again at great cost and 

difficulty.The greatest mass of this system is rocket propellant.

If we develop a source of rocket propellant in space (so that we do not have to lift it up 

from Earth's surface), a new type of operational template might be possible. Instead of 

one-off designs and throwaway assets, we would think about long-term, extensible, and 

maintainable modular systems.The availability of a source of rocket propellant in LEO 

would completely change the way engineers design spacecraft and the way companies 

and the government think about investing in space assets.It would serve to dramatically 

reduce the cost of infrastructure in space to both government and the private sector, thus 

spurring economic investment (and profit).

Cislunar Space: Where All Our Assets Reside 

The various altitudes and levels of orbit around the Earth8 create very different 

environments and capabilities and hence are utilized by many different types of satellites 

designed to take advantage of the opportunities they offer.The closest zone is LEO, a 

space lying roughly within 2,000 kilometers (km) from the Earth, with most satellites 

operating around 200 to 300 km.It is within this zone most human and robotic space 

activity occurs.All satellites must at least pass through this zone before arriving at their 

final destinations.

LEO has many advantages for a variety of missions, including being where orbits are 

closest and easiest to get to.It is largely below the Van Allen radiation belts, so spacecraft 

and instruments are protected from hard radiation.Robotic satellites carry out a variety of 

scientific missions including orbital remote sensing of Earth and its atmosphere.Extended 

human missions are undertaken in LEO, both on temporary orbital spacecraft such as the 

shuttle and permanent facilities such as the ISS.Orbital periods are low (on the order of 

90 minutes) and repeat passes occur at least twice a day over the same area from inclined 

orbits (and on every pass from an equatorial orbit).

Medium Earth orbits (MEO) range from 2,000 km up to about 35,000 km altitude.Orbital 

periods become much longer, which is useful for space applications that require long 

visibility times, such as global positioning systems (GPS).Typically, such applications 

are achieved using constellations of multiple satellites, such that two or more assets can 

work in tandem to achieve the desired result.MEO comprises the Van Allen radiation 

belts and thus is a difficult environment in which to maintain satellite life.

Highly elliptical orbits (HEO) are very elongated (thousands of kilometers at apogee, the 

high point of such an orbit) and have very long orbital periods.Because of their very long 

dwell times at apogee, these orbits are used in some national security missions, as they 
can "hover" over specific areas for long periods of time. Satellite radio also uses this zone 

of cislunar space.

Geosynchronous orbits occur around 35,000 km altitude; their periods coincide with the 

rotation period of the Earth, and thus the satellites appear twice a day over the same spot 

on the Earth's surface.A perfectly equatorial orbit at 35,786 km is a geostationary orbit 

(GEO), in which a satellite appears to be stationary in the sky.These orbits are widely 

used by all nations for a variety of communications purposes and for global weather 

observation and monitoring.GEO is one of the most valuable places in Earth orbit.

Beyond GEO are the Earth-Moon libration points (also called Lagrange points)9; L1 

through L3 are in line with the Earth-Moon baseline, while L4 and L5 trail and lead the 

Moon in its orbit around the Earth.Except for the occasional scientific mission, such as a 

solar wind monitor, the L-points are not used by spacefaring nations at present.These 

points are of great value for transportation nodes and logistics depots.Because they are 

gravitational equipotential points (or weak stability boundaries),10 all points in cislunar 

space can be reached from the L-points with minimal changes in velocity.After the Lpoints, the Moon is the next dominant feature in cislunar space.Both lunar orbit and the 

lunar surface are possible destinations; both are easily accessed using minimal additional 

energy from GEO or the Lagrange points.

All zones of cislunar space have practical and theoretical uses.11All are accessible with 

existing systems, but only once.To continually revisit a given space asset, we must build 

a duplicate of the system that originally got us there.For example, if a communications 

satellite in GEO stops working, the only alternative is to design, build, and launch a 

completely new satellite.There is no way to send either servicing crews or machines to 

repair or upgrade the balky equipment.In short, if the fundamental premise of being a 

spacefaring nation is the ability to routinely conduct missions anywhere in space for a 

variety of purposes, we are actually quite far from that capability.

The Value of the Moon 

Rock and soil samples returned by the Apollo missions taught us the fundamental 

chemical makeup of the Moon.It is a very dry, chemically reduced object, rich in 

refractory elements but poor in volatile elements.Its composition is rather ordinary, made 

up of common rock-forming minerals such as plagioclase (an aluminum-calcium 

silicate), pyroxene (a magnesium-iron silicate), and ilmenite (an iron-titanium oxide).The 

Moon is approximately 45 percent oxygen by weight,12 but this oxygen is tightly bound to 

metals in the surface rocks.Light elements, including hydrogen and carbon, are present in 

small amounts—in a typical soil, hydrogen makes up between 50 and 90 parts per million 

by weight, with similar quantities of carbon and nitrogen.Soils richer in titanium appear 

to be also richer in hydrogen, thus allowing us to infer the extent of hydrogen abundance 

from the titanium concentration mapped from orbit.

Lunar materials offer many possible uses.Because radiation is a serious problem for 

human spaceflight beyond LEO, the simple expedient of covering surface habitats with 
soil can protect future inhabitants from both galactic cosmic rays and even solar 

flares.Lunar soil (regolith) can be sintered by microwave into very strong building 

materials, including bricks and anhydrous glasses that have strengths many times that of 

steel.13When we return to the Moon, we will have no shortage of useful building 

materials.

Because of its abundance on the Moon, oxygen is likely to be an important early 

product.The production of oxygen from lunar materials simply involves breaking the very 

tight chemical bonds between oxygen and various metals in minerals.14Many different 

techniques to accomplish this task have been developed; all are based on common 

industrial processes easily adapted to use on the Moon.Besides human life support, the 

most important use of oxygen in its liquid form is rocket fuel oxidizer.Coupled with the 

extraction of solar wind hydrogen from the soil, this processing can make rocket fuel the 

most important commodity of a new lunar economy.15

The Moon has no atmosphere or global magnetic field, so solar wind (the tenuous stream 

of gases emitted by the Sun, mostly hydrogen) is directly implanted onto surface dust 

grains.Although solar wind hydrogen is present in very small quantities over most of the 

Moon, it too can be extracted from the soil.Soil heated to about 700°C releases more than 

90 percent of its adsorbed solar gases.16Such heat can be obtained from collecting and 

concentrating solar energy using focusing mirrors.Collected by robotic processing rovers, 

solar wind hydrogen can be harvested from virtually any location on the Moon.The recent 

discovery that hydrated minerals are abundant at higher latitudes suggests that water is 

being created constantly at the lunar surface.17Some of this water migrates to the poles 

where it may be concentrated in abundance, thereby making its potential collection and 

use much easier.

The Department of Defense–National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) 

Clementine mission in 1994 made global maps of the mineral and elemental content of 

the Moon.It mapped the shape and topography of its surface with a laser altimeter and 

gave us our first good look at the intriguing and unique polar regions.18 Clementine did 

not carry instruments specifically designed to look for water but an ingenious 

improvisation used the spacecraft communications antenna to beam radio waves into the 

polar regions; the resulting radio echoes, which were observed using antennas on Earth, 

indicate that material with reflection characteristics similar to ice is found in the 

permanently dark areas near the south pole.19This discovery was supported subsequently 

by the discovery of large amounts of hydrogen near both poles20 by a neutron 

spectrometer flown on NASA's Lunar Prospector spacecraft21 in 1998.

Water is added to the Moon over geological time by the impact of comets and waterbearing asteroids.Because the Moon's axis of rotation is nearly perpendicular to the plane 

of the ecliptic (the plane in which Earth and Moon orbit the Sun), the Sun is always near 

the horizon at the poles.If you are in a hole, you never see the Sun, and if you are on a 

peak, you always see it—the Sun goes around, not up and down.Depressions near the 

poles never receive sunlight; these dark areas are very cold—only a few degrees above 

absolute zero.22Any water that gets into these polar cold traps cannot get out, and over 
time, significant quantities can accumulate.Our current best estimate is that over 10 

billion cubic meters of water exist at the poles,23 an amount roughly equal to the volume 

of Utah's Great Salt Lake.Although hydrogen and oxygen can be extracted directly from 

the soil as described above, such processing is difficult and energy-intensive.Polar water 

has the advantage of being in an already concentrated form, greatly simplifying scenarios 

for lunar return and habitation.Broken down into hydrogen and oxygen, water is a vital 

substance both for human life support and rocket propellant.

The poles of the Moon are useful from yet another vital resource perspective: the areas of 

permanent darkness are proximate to areas of near-permanent sunlight.We have 

identified several areas near both the north and south poles that offer near-constant 

illumination by the Sun.24 Moreover, such areas are in darkness for short periods, 

interrupting longer periods of illumination.An outpost or establishment in these areas will 

have the advantage of being in sunlight for the generation of electrical power (via solar 

cells) and in a benign thermal environment (because the sun is always at grazing 

incidence, the surface temperature remains a near-constant -50° ± 10°C);25 such a 

location never experiences the temperature extremes found on the equator (from 100° to 

–150°C) and thus, thermal control is much easier, making the poles of the Moon inviting 

"oases" in near-Earth space.

Besides its material and energy resources, the Moon is an operational laboratory where 

we can experiment with and learn how to conduct planetary surface exploration, 

utilization, and habitation.The Moon is a world, alien yet familiar, that allows us to learn 

the skills needed to make other worlds part of humanity's universe.Those skills can be 

summarized by the words "arrive, survive, and thrive."We need to develop a system that 

allows access to the lunar surface on a routine basis.Thus, we require long-lived reusable 

subsystems and equipment that can take advantage of products made from lunar 

resources.To survive on the Moon, we must protect humans and equipment from the 

harsh surface environment and make consumables.Water production protects habitats and 

supports people with drinking water and breathable oxygen.But for permanent human 

presence on the Moon, we must not only survive, but also thrive.This means that we must 

make "a profit": some product that we make on the Moon must exceed the value of the 

investment in building surface infrastructure.In the near term, such a product is likely to 

be lunar water, the currency of cislunar space.Water exported from the Moon can be used 

to make rocket propellant to fuel a transportation infrastructure and thereby lower the 

costs of spaceflight.

Lunar Return: Incremental Steps 

Although we possess enough information now to plan a lunar return, we should conduct 

new robotic missions to reduce programmatic risk and to generate program 

milestones.The Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter (LRO)26 is now mapping the Moon in 

detail—collecting information on the physical nature of the surface, especially the exotic 

and poorly understood environment of the polar regions.LRO is mapping the polar 

deposits of the Moon using imaging radar to "see" into the dark regions.Such mapping 

will establish the details of water ice locations as well as its thickness, purity, and 
physical state.The next step is to land small robotic probes to conduct chemical analyses 

of the polar deposits.Although we expect water ice to dominate the deposit, comets are 

made of many different substances, including methane, ammonia, and organic molecules, 

all preserved in the polar regions and all potentially useful resources.We need to 

inventory these substances and determine their chemical and isotopic properties as well 

as their physical nature and local environment.Just as robotic missions such as Ranger 

and Surveyor27 paved the way for Apollo, a new set of robotic precursors will make 

subsequent human missions safer and more productive.

As soon as robotic orbiters and landers have documented the nature of the deposits, 

focused exploration and research should be undertaken to develop the machinery needed 

to harvest and process the resources of the Moon.We must understand the physical nature 

of the polar deposits and how we might extract water from its (currently unknown) native 

state.This could mean excavating and moving dirt and/or developing schemes that 

remove the water in place.A variety of mining and extraction processes can be 

experimented with using robotic missions, thus paving the way to industrial-scale 

activities and commercialization of the production of hydrogen and oxygen from lunar 

materials.

Forty years ago, America built the mighty Saturn V to launch men and machines to the 

Moon in one fell swoop.This technical approach was so successful that it has dominated 

the thinking on lunar return for decades.One feature of nearly all architectures of the past 

20 years is the initial requirement to build or rebuild the heavy lift launch capability of 

the Saturn V or its equivalent.However, parts of the Saturn V were literally handmade,28

making it a very expensive spacecraft.Development of any new launch vehicle is an 

enormously expensive proposition.What is needed is an architecture that permits lunar 

return with the least amount of new vehicle development possible (and hence, the lowest 

possible cost.)Such a plan will allow concentration of effort and energy on the most 

important aspects of the mission: learning how to use the Moon's resources to support 

space flight beyond low Earth orbit.29

To deliver the pieces of the lunar spacecraft to Earth orbit—lander, habitat, and transfer 

stage—the architecture should use existing launch assets, including shuttle-derived 

components augmented by existing expendable boosters.Assembled into a package in 

space, these items are then transferred to the Moon-Earth L1.The L1 point orbits the 

Earth with the Moon such that it appears "motionless" in space to both bodies.Because 

there is no requirement for quick transit, cargo and unmanned mission elements can take 

advantage of innovative technologies such as solar electric propulsion and the weak 

stability boundaries between Earth, Sun, and Moon to make long, spiraling trips out to 

L1, thus requiring less propellant mass launched from Earth.30These unmanned cargo 

spacecraft can take several months to get to their destinations.The habitat module can be 

landed on the Moon by remote control and activated to await the arrival of its occupants 

from Earth.Previously landed robotic rovers and robots become part of the surface 

infrastructure and can be used telerobotically to prepare and emplace outpost elements.
The human crew is launched separately in the crew exploration vehicle and uses a 

chemical stage and a quick transfer trajectory to reach the L1 depot in a few days.There, 

the crew can transfer to the lunar lander, descend to the surface, and occupy the preemplaced habitat.Because the outpost elements are already on the Moon, the lunar lander 

does not have to be the 50-metric-ton behemoth called for by the Exploration Systems 

Architecture Study,31 but rather a much smaller, reusable version—its only job is to 

transfer the crew from L1 to the lunar surface.

The preferred site for a lunar outpost is at one of the almost permanently sunlit areas near 

a pole of the Moon.The south pole is attractive from the perspective of both science and 

operations, but final selection should await complete surveys of the poles, so as to locate 

the outpost as close as possible to the highest grade resources.The strategy on the Moon 

is to learn how to mine its resources and build up surface infrastructure to permit everincreasing scales of operation.Each mission brings new components to the surface, and 

the size and capability of the outpost grows over time.

Resource utilization on the Moon will expand with time.Initially, demonstration 

production levels of a few kilograms of product (water, oxygen) will document the 

difficulty of mining and processing.After we determine the optimum techniques, our 

initial production goals are to make consumables (water for drinking, air, and shielding, 

in that order); this requires production levels of hundreds of kilograms.Once this is well 

established, we can begin to make rocket propellant.Initial propellant production at the 

metric ton level can support extended exploration around the lunar outpost and perhaps 

ballistic flights to other locations on the Moon.A major breakpoint will come with the 

production of tens to hundreds of tons of propellant; at such a level, we can export our 

surplus propellant to depots in cislunar space, making it available for commercial sale to 

many different users.It is the ultimate realization of this act that creates a cislunar 

economy and demonstrates a positive return on investment.32

In addition to its technical advantages, this architecture offers important programmatic 

benefits.It does not require the development of a new heavy lift launcher.Costs in space 

launch are almost completely dominated by the costs of people and 

infrastructure.Creating a new launch system requires new infrastructure, new people, and 

new training.Such costs make up significant fractions of the total program.By using 

existing systems,33 we concentrate our resources on new equipment and technology, all 

focused toward the goal of finding, characterizing, processing, and using lunar resources 

as soon as possible.The use of the L1 point as a staging depot allows us to depart at any 

time for both the Earth and Moon; the energy required to go nearly anywhere beyond this 

point is very low.The use of existing, low-thrust propulsion technology (that is, solarelectric) for cargo elements permits us to use time as an asset, not an enemy.We will 

acquire new technical innovation as a byproduct of the objective, not as a critical 

requirement of the architecture.

A New Template for Spacefaring
By mining the Moon for water, we establish a robust transportation infrastructure capable 

of delivering people and machines throughout cislunar space.Make no mistake: learning 

to use the resources of the Moon or any other planetary object will be a challenging 

technical task.We must learn to use machines in remote, hostile environments while 

working under difficult conditions to extract ore bodies of small concentration.The 

unique polar environment, with its zones of near-permanent illumination and permanent 

darkness, provides its own challenges.But for humanity to live and work in space, we 

must learn to use the material and energy resources available off-planet.We are fortunate 

that the Moon offers us a nearby "safe" laboratory where we can take our first steps 

toward using space resources.Initial blunders in operational approach or feedstock 

processing are better practiced at a location 3 days from the Earth than one many months 

away.

A return to the Moon to learn how to use its resources is scalable in both level of effort 

and the types of commodities to be produced.We begin by using the resources that are 

easiest to extract.Thus, the logical first product is water derived from the polar 

deposits.Water can be produced there regardless of the nature of the polar volatiles; ice of 

cometary origin is easily collected and purified.If the polar materials are composed 

instead of molecular hydrogen, this substance can be combined with oxygen extracted 

through a variety of processes from rocks and soil to make water.Water is easily stored 

and will be used as a life-sustaining substance or retained in a separated, cryogenic state 

for use as rocket propellant.

The world relies on a variety of satellites in cislunar space—weather satellites, GPS, 

communications systems, and a wide variety of reconnaissance platforms. Commercial 

spacecraft makes up a multi-billion-dollar market, providing telephone, Internet, radio, 

and video services.America has invested billions in space hardware.Yet at the moment, 

we have no infrastructure to service, repair, refurbish, or protect any of these spacecraft.

They are vulnerable to severe damage or permanent loss by accident or intentional 

action.If we lose a satellite, it must be replaced.From redesign though fabrication and 

launch, such replacement takes years and involves extraordinary investment in the design 

and fabrication to make them as reliable as possible.

We cannot access these spacecraft because it is not feasible to maintain a human-tended 

servicing capability in Earth orbit; at thousands of dollars per pound, the costs of 

launching orbital transfer vehicles and propellant are excessive. Creating the ability to 

refuel in orbit by using propellant made from lunar materials will revolutionize the way 

nations view and use space.Satellites will be repaired rather than abandoned.Assets can 

be protected rather than written off. Very large satellite complexes can be built and 

serviced over long periods, creating new capabilities and expanding bandwidth (a critical 

commodity of modern society) for a wide variety of purposes.And along the way, there 

will be new opportunities and discoveries.We will become a true spacefaring species.

A return to the Moon with the purpose of learning to extract and use its resources creates 

a new paradigm for space operations.Space becomes a realm in our economic sphere, not 

an exotic environment for arcane studies.Such a mission ties the American space program 
to its original roots, making us more secure and more prosperous.It also enables new and 

broader opportunities for science and exploration.A transportation infrastructure that can 

routinely access various points of cislunar space can take humanity to the planets.We will 

learn to use what we find in space to create new spacefaring capabilities.A cislunar 

transportation system, fueled by lunar propellant, will be the transcontinental railroad of 

the new millennium.34

Notes

1. Krafft A. Ehricke, "Lunar Industrialization and Settlement—Birth of a Polyglobal Civilization," 

Lunar Bases and Space Activities of the 21st Century (1985), 827–855. 

2. George W. Bush, "A Renewed Spirit of Discovery," press release, Executive Office of the 

President, Washington, DC, 2004, available at 

<www.spaceref.com/news/viewpr.html?pid=13404>. 

3. NASA Authorization Act of 2005, S.1281 ENR, available at 

<www.govtrack.us/congress/bill.xpd?bill=s109-1281.>

4. NASA Authorization Act of 2008, H.R.6063 ENR, available at <http://thomas.loc.gov/cgibin/query/D?c110:6:./temp/~c110UMnxII::>. 

5. P.D. Spudis, The Once and Future Moon (Washington, DC: Smithsonian Institution Press, 1996). 

6. J. Marburger, speech to the 44th Robert H. Goddard Memorial Symposium, March 15, 2006, 

available at <www.spaceref.com/news/viewsr.html?pid=19999>.

7. "Tsiolkovsky Rocket Equation," available at <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rocket_equation>.

8. "List of orbits," available at <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_orbits>.

9. "Lagrangian point," available at <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lagrangian_point>.

10. W.W. Mendell, "A Gateway for Human Exploration of Space? The Weak Stability Boundary," 

Space Policy 17 (2001), 13–17.

11. T. Cremins and P.D. Spudis, "The Strategic Context of the Moon:Echoes of the Past, Symphony 

of the Future," Astropolitics5 (2007), 87–104.

12. G. Heiken, D. Vaniman, and B. French, eds., The Lunar Sourcebook: A User's Guide to the Moon

(Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1991).

13. L.A. Taylor, E. Hill, and Y. Liu, "Unique lunar soil properties for ISRU microwave processing," 

in Space Resources Roundtable 2005 (Houston: Lunar and Planetary Institute, 2005), 2075, 

available at <www.lpi.usra.edu/meetings/leag2005/pdf/2075.pdf>. 

14. D.M. Burt, "Mining the Moon," American Scientist (November–December 1980), 574–579.

15. P.D. Spudis, "Augustine Commission and Space Exploration: Objectives before Architectures, 

Strategies before Tactics," Spaceref.com, available at 

<www.spaceref.com/news/viewnews.html?id=1349>.

16. L.A. Haskin, "Water and Cheese from the Lunar Desert: Abundances and Accessibility of H, C, 

and N on the Moon," Second Conference on Lunar Bases and Space Activities of the 21st Century, 

1992, available at <http://tinyurl.com/y88d6mm>. 

17. C. Pieters et al., "Character and Spatial Distribution of OH/H2O on the Surface of the Moon Seen 

by M3 on Chandrayaan-1," Science 23 (October 2009). 

18. S. Nozette et al., "The Clementine Mission to the Moon: Scientific Overview," Science 266 

(1994), 1835–1839.

19. S. Nozette et al., "The Clementine Bistatic Radar Experiment," Science 274 (1996), 1495–1498.

20. W.C. Feldman et al., "Polar Hydrogen Deposits on the Moon," Journal of Geophysical Research 

105 (2000), E2, 4175–4195.

21. A. Binder, "Lunar Prospector: Overview," Science 281 (1998), 1475–1476.

22. A.R. Vasavada, D.A. Paige, and S.E. Wood, "Near-surface Temperatures on Mercury and the 

Moon and the Stability of Polar Ice Deposits," Icarus 141 (1999), 179–193.
23. P.D. Spudis, "Ice on the Moon," TheSpaceReview.com, 2006, available at 

www.thespacereview.com/article/740/1.

24. D.B.J. Bussey, P.D. Spudis, and M.S. Robinson, "Illumination Conditions at the Lunar South 

Pole," Geophysical Research Letters 26, no. 9 (1999), 1187.

25. Heiken, Vaniman, and French. 

26. "Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter," available at <http://lunar.gsfc.nasa.gov/>.

27. D.M. Harland, Paving the Way for Apollo 11 (Berlin: Praxis, 2009).

28. M. Gray, Angle of Attack: Harrison Storms and the Race to the Moon (New York: Norton, 1992).

29. Spudis, "Augustine Commission."

30. V.R. Bond et al., "Cislunar Libration Point as a Transportation Node for Lunar Exploration," 

AAS/AIAA Spaceflight Mechanics Meeting, 1991, AAS–91–103.

31. National Aeronautics and Space Administration, "Exploration Systems Architecture Study," 2005, 

available at <www.nasa.gov/exploration/news/ESAS_report.html>.

32. D. Wingo, P.D. Spudis, and G. Woodcock, "Going Beyond the Status Quo in Space," 

SpaceRef.com, 2009, available at <www.spaceref.com/news/viewnews.html?id=1334>.

33. F. Zeglar, B.F. Kutter, and J. Barr, "A Commercially Based Lunar Architecture,"AIAA Space 2009 

Conference and Exposition, AIAA 2009–6567, available at<http://tinyurl.com/l9efn5>. 

34. Spudis, "Augustine Commission." 
Chapter 13:

Spacepower and the Environment

Eligar Sadeh

This chapter focuses on the unique environmental concerns that can both inhibit and 

enhance space as a domain of national security power. A number of concerns are 

examined, including the links between space and the environment on Earth, the orbital 

environment, and the environment of space beyond the orbital paths of space assets. 

Within this context, several important questions are raised:

• What roles will space play in the advancement of life on Earth and the future of 

humanity?

• How susceptible are civil, commercial, and military space assets to interference, 

disablement, and destruction from environmental threats in space?

• What is the importance of spacepower to scientific exploration?

• What are the political and legal paths to spacepower projection as a result of 

dealing with space and environmental concerns?

The first part of the chapter investigates the "global dimension" of space and 

environment. It begins with a discussion of environmental security and reviews a number 

of global environmental dangers. The environmental degradation of the Earth and 

anthropogenic influences on global climate change directly relate to the advancement of 

life on Earth and the future of humanity. The exploitation of natural resources is linked to 

economic stress, instability, and conflict. Earth observations from space play a role in 

monitoring and helping to assess changes in the Earth's environment that are applicable to 

security issues.

Although there is little agreement among scholars and practitioners on the definition of 

environmental security—just as there is little coherence on the definitions of spacepower, 

as this book makes clear—environmental security involves the issues of conflict and its 

prevention and state authority or control over sovereignty as they are linked to national, 

regional, and global environmental factors.1 The second part of the chapter probes these 

issues of environmental security. How conflicts are prevented is first examined through 

the role of international and regional environmental agreements and the role of Earth 

observation satellites in monitoring the global environment. State authority is scrutinized 

through an assessment of Earth observations in the civil and commercial sectors and of 

implications for national security in terms of a loss of state control over sovereignty.

The third part of this chapter analyzes the issues of space situational awareness (SSA) 

and the use of space to project power and to provide for national, regional, and 

international security. Specific to the focus of space and the environment are the threats 

to space assets as a result of orbital debris and near Earth objects (NEOs) that may impact 
Earth (potentially hazardous NEOs). The evolution of the orbital debris issue is surveyed, 

and the political measures by which it is managed are explained. The issue of NEOs is 

one of providing for planetary defense, an important end for the advancement of life on 

Earth. Planetary defense is investigated within the scope of spacepower as it applies to 

detection and mitigation strategies to deal with potentially hazardous NEOs.

Finally, spacepower deals with control of the space environment to achieve superiority 

there. This suggests a relationship between spacepower and protecting the environment in 

space. Protection of the environment concerns SSA and orbital debris as well as making 

sure that harmful contamination in space, on planetary bodies, or on Earth resulting from 

the introduction of extraterrestrial matter is managed and prevented. This problem of 

harmful contamination, which is discussed in the last part of the chapter, is one of 

planetary protection.

Environmental Security and Global Environmental Dangers 

There are several noteworthy views regarding environmental security. One view is 

represented by United Nations (UN) programs and associated nongovernmental 

organizations dealing with the environment and development.2 These organizations stress 

the state of environmental degradation on a global scale, and they see that degradation as 

a security threat. The very nature of the global environmental dangers that exist imperils 

national security by undermining natural support systems on which all human activity 

depends. Table 13–1 lists a selected set of global environmental dangers.

Table 13–1. Global Environmental Dangers

• Ozone layer depletion

• Global climate change due to greenhouse gas emissions

• Extreme weather events

• Sea level rise

• Retreating glaciers

• Spread of life-threatening diseases

• Radioactive spills from leaking nuclear submarines or nuclear waste storage tanks

• Nuclear bomb tests

• Accidents in nuclear plants

• Environmental impacts of and modification during war

• Spills from stockpiles of old weapons

• Oil spills and pollution

• Food security

• Water scarcity and pollution including ground water contamination

• Increasing international river usage

• Soil erosion and salinization

• Deforestation and desertification

• Human migration

• Human population growth

• Loss of biodiversity
• Habitat shifts

• Industrial development and contamination of air and oceans

• Fishery depletion due to over-fishing

• Transplantation of alien species into new ecosystems

• Disposal of hazardous and toxic wastes

• Destruction of coral reefs

A second view on environmental security emerges from scholarly work on the subject. 

Since the 1970s, scholars have argued that environmental concerns should be 

incorporated into the national security calculations of the state.3 The argument is that 

ecological integrity plays a role in the economic, social, and political stability of states. 

Environmental scarcity, as a result of many of the environmental dangers listed in table 

13–1, is inextricably linked to socioeconomic and sociopolitical instability, which can 

engender conflicts between states.

Scholarly attention to the globalization phenomenon further links the issue of ecology 

into the national security equation. Globalization represents the integration of capital, 

technology, trade, and information across national borders.4 This integration manifests 

itself as a set of complex interdependencies characterized by linkages among politics, 

national security, cultures, markets, technology, and ecology. National security power 

projection as viewed through the lens of globalization is about maintaining the stability of 

the international system, which is linked to maintaining the ability to cope with and adapt 

to global environmental changes. This can be conceptualized through the national 

security notion of systems administration.5 This aspect of national security power is the 

basis of one significant view of environmental security within the national security 

establishment in the United States.

Global environmental dangers can undermine the stability of the international system and 

lead to political, economic, and violent conflicts. To illustrate, a North Atlantic Treaty 

Organization (NATO) study from 1996 and a report published by the CNA Corporation 

(CNAC)6 in 2007 that was authored by a number of retired flag officers identified several 

problem areas of environmental conflict.7 The NATO study assessed potential conflicts 

over natural resource scarcities, which are a cause for intrastate and interstate migrations 

that trigger political, ethnic, and cultural conflicts. In addition, scarcities are tied to 

poverty and health problems due to limited food supplies, unavailability of fresh water, 

famine, and the spread of infectious diseases. Anthropogenic global environmental 

change and degradation—for example, greenhouse gas pollution, ozone depletion, 

climate change, loss of biodiversity, desertification, and deforestation—alter the 

availability and distribution of natural resources. In this perspective on environmental 

security, the systems administrator must deal with cooperative paths to power projection. 

The cooperative paths entail collective action and collective security arrangements.

The CNAC report examined climate change as an issue for national and international 

security. Climate change as a cause for many of the global environmental dangers listed 

in table 13–1 leads to "sustained natural and humanitarian disasters that will likely foster 

instability where societal demands exceed the capacity for governments to cope."8 In this 
regard, climate change is a threat multiplier for instability and conflict. The threat 

multiplier manifests itself as "geostrategic" and regional implications analogous to what 

was assessed with the NATO study. The CNAC report recommends that climate change 

be fully integrated into national defense strategies and that the United States commit to a 

role as systems administrator to help stabilize climate change and to help other 

governments cope with global environmental dangers. This indicates that spacepower 

calculations, as part of national defense strategies, need to account for climate change and 

that a U.S. leadership role on the issues of climate change is part and parcel of the 

national and international security equations. One central concern that flows from these 

suggestions, denoted with the NATO study as well, has to do with conflict prevention. 

Spacepower is a factor that can facilitate conflict prevention.

Conflict Prevention 

Collective action as a basis for power projection is a consequence of the fact that the 

global environment and the environment in outer space are each a commons. These 

environmental commons lie outside the jurisdiction and sovereignty of any individual 

state and are valued resources globally. In the case of the global environment, agreed 

upon commons include the global climate system and the stratospheric ozone layer. In the 

case of outer space, they are free space itself, orbital paths around the Earth, and celestial 

bodies. These environmental resources are in joint supply and nationally 

nonappropriable. Joint supply signifies equal potential availability to the commons by all 

states. Nonappropriability specifies that states cannot extend their jurisdiction and 

sovereignty to the commons. It is impossible to exclude states from sharing in the 

benefits of the commons or from suffering the consequences caused by damage to the 

commons. Together, joint supply and nonappropriability constitute free access and free 

use and, as it concerns spacepower, the policy of freedom of action in space.

A commons that is unregulated can result in a "tragedy of the commons."9 This situation 

is rooted in the rational self-interested state behavior regarding commons resources. It is a 

function of damage to the environment caused by free access and free use, like the release 

of greenhouse gases into the Earth's biosphere, the proliferation of orbital debris, or the 

possibility of harmful contamination of outer space or celestial bodies. To mitigate these 

tragedies, collective action is necessary. The environmental commons posits a collective 

action problem as to how to formulate and implement international cooperation to 

regulate at some level free access and free use.

This point in the chapter focuses on the global environment and international cooperation 

directed at managing the root causes of environmental change that lead to instability and 

conflict. The collective action response as observed in international environmental laws 

and laws that limit military activities in space portends for a collective "rules of the road" 

approach to spacepower as one way to mitigate tragedies of the commons, such as orbital 

debris proliferation and other harmful contamination of space (the rules of the road theme 

is discussed in chapter 20 of this book).10 Later in this chapter, collective action and 

freedom of action in space are explored in the cases of orbital debris, planetary defense, 

and planetary protection.
International environmental law regulates how states and their entities interact with the 

environmental commons. The onset of the development of international environmental 

law dates back to the UN Conference on the Human Environment held in Stockholm in 

1972. This conference elevated the environment to a major issue at the international 

level. Stockholm focused on the degradation of the biophysical environment of the Earth 

due to human activities. The conference led to the establishment of the UN 

Environmental Program, which is at the forefront globally in calling for sustainable 

development—that is, human and economic development that mitigates further 

degradation of the environment and natural resources.11

Within the context of sustainable development, the World Commission on Environment 

and Development issued a report in 1987 entitled Our Common Future.

12 The report 

offered a definition of sustainable development as "development that meets the needs of 

the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own 

needs," and highlighted global warming and ozone layer depletion as environmental 

problems. Following this, in 1992, under the auspices of the UN Conference on the 

Environment and Development, an Earth Summit was held in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. The 

summit led to the Rio Declaration on the Environment and Development and an action 

plan, called Agenda 21, to realize the ideas of sustainable development therein.13 Agenda 

21 is the most significant and influential political instrument in the environmental field, 

serving as the blueprint for environmental management throughout the world. The whole 

notion of sustainable development and its implementation and management is in part a 

security issue in that it addresses the root cause of environmental security issues 

discussed earlier.

Two areas of development in international environmental law dealing with ozone 

depletion and global warming are examples of how global environmental dangers can 

result in collective paths to agreement and management. The paths to the respective 

agreements, the Montreal Protocol on Substances that Deplete the Ozone Layer and the 

Kyoto Protocol to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change, are a 

story of how the state of knowledge—that is, science on the global issues—influences 

states to act in collective ways to manage global environmental problems.14 Earth 

observation satellites, which play a critical role in monitoring the state of global 

environmental dangers, resulted in many of the advances in knowledge. Table 13–2 maps 

the cooperative path in the case of the Montreal Protocols and highlights the role of Earth 

observation satellites.

Table 13–2. Cooperative Paths to the Montreal Protocols

Year Event

1956 First Antarctic ozone measurements

1971 Congress terminates Supersonic Transport funding

1973 Space shuttle exhaust linked to ozone destruction (chlorine loading)

1974 Chlorofluorocarbons (CFCs)-ozone depletion hypothesis published in Nature

1974 Antarctic measurements regularly conducted
1975 National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) conducts upper 

atmosphere research as directed by U.S. Congress

1976 First discussion of ozone at United Nations Environmental Program (UNEP)

1977 UNEP and World Meteorological Organization (WMO) establish coordinating 

committee on ozone 

1977 U.S. Congress amends Clean Air Act to report on status of ozone

1978 U.S. Congress bans CFCs in aerosol sprays

1978 Nimbus-7 launched, Total Ozone Mapping Spectrometer 

(TOMS) (returned data to 1993)

1978 First CFC replacement announced (replacements economically profitable)

1981 International negotiations begin on ozone issue

1985 Vienna Convention (precautionary principle collective action)

1985 UNEP Ozone Secretariat established

1985 British Antarctic Survey publishes ozone hole data in Nature

1985–

1989

Nimbus-7 TOMS data transmitted to public (record ozone hole in 1987 

and 1989)

1986 Comprehensive report on ozone depletion (NASA and WMO); 85 percent 

restriction

1987 Alignment of U.S.–European Community (EC) positions on CFC reductions

1987 Montreal Protocol; 50 percent restriction (compromise solution); in force 1989 

1988 United States, Europe, and Japan ratify Montreal Protocol

1988 Report on ozone trends (NASA, UNEP, WMO); more stringent control 

measures

1988 DuPont agrees on phaseout of CFCs (industry agreement with problem)

1988 UNEP workshops that resolved modeling discrepancies in relation to ozone

1988-89 Global climate change on the U.S. political agenda (Global Change Research 

Program in 1989)

1989 EC calls for phasing out CFCs

1989 Synthesis Report (chlorine-loading issue); revisions in Montreal Protocol

1990 London Amendment to Montreal Protocol (scientific consensus, equity, 

controls); in force 1992 

1990 U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) issues further restrictive CFC 

guidelines

1990-92 Brazil, China, and India accessions to Montreal Protocol

1991 NASA announced severe ozone depletion, lowest values in 13 years of 

monitoring

1991-92 U.S. Senate calls for CFC phaseout; 1992 Executive order to end use of CFCs

1991 NASA launches Upper Atmosphere Research Satellite (returned data to 

2005) 

1992 NASA announced severity of problem for Arctic (up to 30 percent ozone 

loss)

1992 Copenhagen Amendments to Montreal Protocol (controls); in force 1994; CFC 

phaseout by 1995
1993 Trade sanctions against nonsignatory countries

1994 NASA indicates conclusive evidence of ozone depletion-chlorine link

1996 NASA report shows concentrations of ozone depleting chemicals beginning 

to level off

1997 Montreal Amendments to Montreal Protocol (licensing system for trade issue); 

in force 1999 

1998 Sweden first country to ban all CFC uses

1999 Beijing Amendments (control measures, bromide loading issue); in force 2002

2000 Largest ever Antarctic ozone hole detected

2001 UNEP reports results in nearly eliminating production of CFCs

2002 European Space Agency launches Envisat with ozone measuring sensors

2004 NASA launches Aura to study ozone (Earth atmospheric chemistry)

In addition to the examples of international environmental law discussed above, there are 

international laws that place specific limits on military uses of space. These laws 

constrain the means a state can use to realize freedom of action in space and spacepower 

projection. The relevant laws and constraints include:

• the Limited Test Ban Treaty of 1963 and the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty of 

1996 (which supplanted the 1963 one), which prohibit the conduct of nuclear 

weapons tests in outer space. Neither the United States nor China has signed or 

ratified the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty as of 2009.

• the Outer Space Treaty of 1967, which prohibits the deployment of weapons of 

mass destruction in space and the stationing of military bases, but not military 

personnel, in space or on celestial bodies, and calls for "peaceful uses" of space, 

which is understood as no aggressive uses of space that harm or interfere with 

another state's access and use of space.

• the bilateral Anti-Ballistic Missile (ABM) Treaty of 1972 between the United 

States and Russia, which many legal experts viewed as preventing a 

weaponization of space since it prohibited the deployment of space-based ABM 

systems, which do include most types of kinetic-kill space weapons that could be 

developed and deployed. The United States withdrew from this treaty in 2002.

• the Convention on Registration of Objects Launched into Outer Space of 1974, 

which requires states to register objects launched into space with the United 

Nations. This obligation helps to enable SSA and supports the view that such 

awareness should be shared and transparent to the extent possible without 

harming national security. This is the policy and practice of SSA in the United 

States.

• the Environmental Modification Convention of 1980, which prohibits military use 

of environmental modification techniques in space. The Outer Space Treaty also 

prohibits harmful contamination of the space environment.
• the Moon Agreement of 1984, which sought to demilitarize the Moon and celestial 

bodies and declare the Moon the "Common Heritage of Mankind."15 It has little to 

no legal validity since no space powers have ratified it.

Earth Observation Satellites 

The development of remote sensing satellite systems—Earth observation platforms—was 

driven initially by national security policies aimed at acquiring intelligence from the use 

of space assets. This led to the intelligence space program that is in place in the United 

States. At the same time, satellite use for weather monitoring emerged as a valuable asset 

for civil and military use. Beginning in the 1970s, remote sensing systems evolved to deal 

with environmental monitoring. The Landsat program in the United States began in 1972 

with a focus on natural resource monitoring. The success of the Landsat program, which 

exists to this day with Landsat 7, and the issues associated with global change and global 

warming led to the U.S. Global Change Research Act of 1990. This act established an 

Earth observation program, the U.S. Global Change Research Program, aimed at 

understanding and responding to global change, including the cumulative effects of 

human activities and natural processes on the environment, and at promoting discussion 

toward international agreements in global change research.16

At the national level, the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) was 

tasked as the key implementing agency for the U.S. Global Change Research Program. 

This led to the development of NASA's Earth Sciences mission area and the Earth 

Observing System (EOS) that NASA implemented.17 At the international level, 

agreements were reached on Earth observation data policies, which generally endorse 

open access to Earth observation data on the premises of nonexclusion and 

nondiscrimination. The 1986 UN Principles Relating to Remote Sensing of the Earth 

from Outer Space adopt such an open access policy. The principles state that as soon as 

the primary data and the processed data concerning the territory under its jurisdiction are 

produced, the sensed state shall have access on a nondiscriminatory basis.18 This very 

principle forms the basis for the data policy agreement reached through the Committee on 

Earth Observation Satellites (CEOS), established in 1984 to coordinate data management 

and policy issues for all spaceborne Earth observation missions. Membership in CEOS is 

open to all international and national organizations responsible for Earth observation 

satellites currently operating or in development phases.19 The United States applies 

nondiscriminatory open access policies for Earth observation data at the national level 

through the Land Remote Sensing Policy Act of 1992 and the subsequent final rules 

issued by the U.S. Department of Commerce for Licensing of Private Land Remote 

Sensing Space Systems.

The evolution of Earth observations in the civil sector resulted in the political and legal 

view that data acquired through remote sensing is a public good marked by nonexclusion 

and nondiscrimination. Data as a public good has implications for national security as to 

the control over knowledge and information. Historically, states controlled knowledge 

through the concept of sovereignty. Earth observation satellites make sovereignty 

"transparent" because data acquired on the natural resources of a state are public goods 
that are available to any user either free of charge, as in the case of NASA's EOS 

program, or at a minimal processing fee per user request. This represents a constraint on 

the projection of national security power in the sense that the state is forced to sacrifice 

some control over knowledge about its territory in exchange for the benefits in use of that 

knowledge. Concomitantly, this "sovereignty bargain" can mitigate the constraints of 

sovereignty and national interests in trying to achieve cooperative paths to spacepower. 

Formulating rules of the road to preserve freedom of action in space so that the benefits 

of Earth observations can be attained is one example.

The theme of Earth observations and collective action is an important one. International 

cooperation pertaining to Earth observations by satellites directed at assessing global 

environmental change is represented by a collective action milieu (see table 13–3). The 

goal of this collaborative milieu is to advance scientific knowledge of the Earth's 

environment to understand and predict human-induced and natural global environmental 

change phenomena. Science serves as the end, while politics, a broad-based institutional 

structure of states, international organizations, and scientific communities, provides the 

means. One of the crucial factors in this case of international cooperation is the ability of 

transnational networks of Earth system scientists to work together in analyzing global 

change data and to translate those analyses into policy-relevant actions. This involves 

both coordinating missions and addressing data policy issues dealing with conditions and 

access to data, data pricing, periods of exclusive data use, and data archiving.20

Cooperation aims to meet scientific and operational needs as well as satisfy data access 

and data exchange requirements for all parties as effectively as possible.

Table 13–3. Collective Action Milieu for Global Change Science

Level of Activity Political Actors

Subnational

(United States)

American Meteorological Society; American Geophysical Union; Center for Global 

Change; Electric Power Research Institute; Environmental Defense Fund; Federation 

of American Scientists; Global Tomorrow Coalition; National Academy of Sciences; 

Goddard Institute for Space Studies; National Center for Atmospheric Research; 

Natural Resources Defense Council; National Climatic Data Center; Physicians for 

Social Responsibility; Sierra Club; Union of Concerned Scientists; World Resources 

Institute; Worldwatch Institute

National

(United States)

U.S. Global Change Research Program—

Subcommittee on Global Change Research 

Department of Agriculture; National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration; 

Department of Defense; Department of Energy; National Institute of Environmental 

Health Sciences; U.S. Geological Survey; Department of State; Environmental 

Protection Agency; National Aeronautics and Space Administration; National Science 

Foundation; Smithsonian Institution 

Transnational Greenpeace; International Council for Science (ISCU); International Geosphere 

Biosphere Program 

International UN Committee on the Peaceful Uses of Outer Space; UN Conference on Environment 

and Development; Economic and Social Commission of Asia and the Pacific; UN 

Education, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO); UN Environmental 
Program (UNEP); Food and Agricultural Organization (FAO); UN Framework 

Convention on Climate Change; Intergovernmental Oceanographic Commission 

(IOC); World Climate Research Program; World Commission on the Environment and 

Development; World Meteorological Organization (WMO)

Cross-Level

(National,

Transnational,

International)

Committee on Earth Observation Satellites 

Global Climate Observing System: ICSU, UNESCO, UNEP, IOC, WMO

Global Ocean Observing System: ICSU, UNEP, WMO

Global Terrestrial Observing System: ICSU, UNESCO, UNEP, FAO, WMO

Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change: UNEP, WMO

Political considerations concerned with data policy, national sovereignty, and national 

security issues influence collective action in the area of Earth observations.21 The 

existence of disparate and incompatible data access policies among various satellite types 

and programs is reinforced in the retention of data by its producers, the requirement of 

licenses to use data, and the pricing of data above marginal costs of fulfilling user 

requirements. Harmonizing policies over these issues is one of the most difficult hurdles 

to surmount in fashioning international cooperation.22

The Committee on Earth Observation Satellites plays a central role in advancing the 

harmonization issue. The primary objectives of CEOS are to optimize the benefits of 

Earth observations through cooperation of its members in mission planning and in 

developing compatible data products, formats, services, applications, and policies; aid 

both its members and the international user community through international 

coordination of Earth observation activities; and exchange technical information to 

encourage compatibility among the different Earth observation systems.23 CEOS data 

exchange principles have been adopted for global environmental change research use and 

for operational public benefit use with the agreement to make data available to each 

member in these user categories with no period of exclusive use and on a 

nondiscriminatory basis. There is a commitment to provide data at the lowest possible 

cost to bona fide researchers and to harmonize and preserve all data needed for long-term 

global change research and monitoring.

The concern with sovereignty and national security is that remote sensing data undercuts 

the ability of the state to control both the creation and the application of knowledge.24

One important sovereignty concern is the proliferation of commercial remote sensing 

systems. This gives rise to the knowledge diffusion and sovereignty bargains mentioned 

earlier. Proliferation of high-resolution imagery has potential national security 

repercussions of particular concern since the events of September 11 and the ensuing 

global war on terrorism. First, increased certainty of an adversary's capabilities may 

negate the foundation for deterrence. Second, the possibility exists of misinterpretation 

and international deception leading to shifts in balances of power and conflict. And third, 

asymmetrical access to satellite imagery and processing capabilities could provide 

substantial advantages for some states over their neighbors—for example, developed 

states over developing ones—with destabilizing effects on the international system.
The development of a remote sensing commercial sector exacerbates the control of 

knowledge by advancing "global transparency." In the civil or public sector, it is well 

understood that remote sensing data primarily serves scientific research use and valueadded uses for natural resource management. Further, such data is at relatively low 

spatial resolutions, limiting its utility for intelligence use. Data is an economic 

commodity in the commercial sector, which has developed and deployed systems with 

high spatial resolutions at less than 1 meter (m) that can be used for intelligence purposes. 

In fact, it is the policy of the U.S. Government, under the Land Remote Sensing Policy 

Act of 1992, Presidential Decision Directive (PDD) 23 issued by the Clinton 

administration, and the U.S. Commercial Remote Sensing Policy put forward by 

President Bush in 2003, to foster the development of commercial imagery systems with 

spatial resolutions of less than 1 m.

While the policies support the development of a remote sensing industry and mandate 

government data buyout contracts with commercial remote sensing operators in the 

United States, the threats that commercial systems pose to national security were 

recognized as well. After all, information dominance enables spacepower projection. This 

recognition was manifested in PDD 23 and reiterated in the 2003 Bush policy as "shutter 

control" directed to protect U.S. national security and foreign policy interests. Shutter 

control allows the Secretaries of Defense and State to determine when national security, 

international obligations, and/or foreign policy could be compromised as a result of 

commercial remote sensing and mandate specific restrictions as to where on Earth the 

commercial systems can acquire data. The shutter control policy attempts to mitigate the 

loss of control of knowledge that can harm national security. Despite this concern, shutter 

control is difficult to apply and for the most part has not proven to be a viable policy, 

although it remains a concern for the commercial interests of the remote sensing sector.

Since the emergence of commercial uses of remote sensing, resolution limitations 

imposed to protect national security have lessened. In the late 1970s, the Carter 

administration lowered the spatial resolution limit on nonmilitary remote sensing systems 

to 10 m. After the U.S. Congress passed the Land Remote Sensing Policy Act of 1992 

directed to end the Federal monopoly on remote sensing technology and data distribution, 

numerous commercial interests began to apply for remote sensing satellite licenses and 

lobbied for lower spatial resolution restrictions. PDD 23 removed spatial resolution 

restrictions on commercial remote sensing satellites, making the resolution limit a 

decision to be made by the Department of Commerce, the authority licensing the system, 

on a case-by-case basis. This stood in stark contrast to the previous national security 

protection elements of imposing spatial resolution limits and access to remotely sensed 

data.25

U.S. Government authorities have continuously debated shutter control since PDD 23 

was issued. In an attempt to further clarify when and how shutter control might be 

implemented, the Department of Commerce signed a memorandum of understanding 

(MOU) with the U.S. Departments of State, Defense, and Interior and the Intelligence 

Community as to how they would work together during the licensing process to make 

certain that all the elements of national security are taken into consideration. The MOU 
discussed when and how shutter control restrictions could be placed upon a system. In 

response to the concern of commercial satellite operators, the MOU makes the shutter 

control decision occur at the highest levels of the respective governmental departments. If 

they cannot agree, the issue is sent to the President for a decision.26

In the aftermath of September 11 and during subsequent military operations in 

Afghanistan, the United States opted not to exercise shutter control as specifically 

described in PDD 23 and the MOU. However, it did make use of alternative means to 

control the use of remotely sensed data. In October 2001, the National Imagery and 

Mapping Agency (NIMA) signed a contract with Space Imaging, whose Ikonos satellite 

was the only U.S. commercial high-resolution satellite operating at the time, for the 

exclusive rights to Ikonos imagery collected over Afghanistan and the surrounding 

areas.27 This arrangement established a way to control data distribution from U.S. 

commercial operators and data providers, albeit via methods other than what was 

originally intended with the shutter control policy.

During the blackout on the distribution of high-resolution Ikonos data outside the U.S. 

Intelligence Community, ImageSat International, an Israeli firm, sold high-resolution 

imagery to news media and other organizations on the open market. As the U.S. war 

efforts in Afghanistan continued, NIMA discontinued the imagery buyout of Ikonos data. 

Furthermore, DigitalGlobe successfully launched and continues to operate QuickBird and 

Worldview 1 at lower panchromatic spatial resolutions than Ikonos (0.6 m for Quickbird 

and 0.5 m for Worldview versus 1 m for Ikonos).

Commercial remote sensing systems also existed prior to Ikonos, such as Spot Image in 

France, ImageSat, and commercial remote sensing entities and commercial data products 

in Canada, Europe, India, and Russia. These developments further indicate that shutter 

control may not be a viable policy, and that global transparency and the associated factor 

of loss of control over sovereignty represent new international norms with which national 

security power and spacepower projection must contend. For spacepower, this implies 

that true information dominance cannot be achieved, and counterspace operations or 

applications of force aimed at preserving freedom of action in space would not be applied 

to commercial assets absent a global scale conflict. As a result, the state is forced into a 

sovereignty bargain that reiterates the theme of collective action and cooperation as ways 

to further spacepower interests.28

Orbital Debris 

The fact that space is legally defined as a commons underlies freedom of action there—

that is, the free use of and free access to the space environment for peaceful purposes that 

include military uses for self-defense and for collective defense as stipulated in the Outer 

Space Treaty and the UN Charter. Free access to and free use of the space commons, not 

unlike the global environment, can lead to a potential tragedy of the commons in that a 

resource that people share can become exploited to the detriment of all users.
Space is subject to joint use and availability. Therefore, any user may exploit the resource 

since exclusion is impossible or impractical. As a consequence, the resource value of 

space may diminish as a result of overuse or misuse. The costs and benefits associated 

with commons' use are likely to be distributed asymmetrically, and it is even conceivable 

that those who benefit may not pay a use cost.29 For space, the problem of the commons 

is perhaps most notable in the growing problem of space debris.

The U.S. Air Force Space Command, through the Space Surveillance Network, routinely 

tracks and catalogues all human-made debris objects. This information is provided to and 

used by the civil, commercial, and military space sectors. For example, NASA uses the 

data on every space shuttle flight and has made numerous orbital corrections over the 

years to avoid collision. The same holds true for the International Space Station even 

though the ability for orbital correction is more limited. The space environment is 

populated by millions of pieces of orbital debris from a range of sources, such as inactive 

spacecraft, spent rocket bodies, operational debris from satellites and other payloads, 

fragmentation debris as a result of debris collisions, paint flakes, and particulates from 

propellant fuels. Collisions with pieces of debris greater than 10 millimeters (mm) in size 

can produce catastrophic damage to spacecraft. Even smaller debris ranging from 1 mm 

to 10 mm can be destructive as it can produce impact damage that can be serious 

depending upon system vulnerabilities and defensive design provisions against debris. 

Orbital debris smaller than 1 mm can cause surface pitting and erosion of materials; for 

example, 0.1 mm debris can potentially penetrate a spacesuit. The International Space 

Station is shielded to protect from smaller debris, and military space assets are hardened 

in many cases for such protection. 

The millions of debris particles smaller than 1 mm are beyond detection capabilities from 

satellite or ground-based radar observing systems. Despite the fact that technical 

capabilities exist to systematically track debris at about 50 mm in size, the U.S. Air Force 

Space Command nominally tracks and catalogues debris of about 100 mm or greater in 

size.30 This discrepancy between what is possible and what is accomplished is one of the 

key political issues facing SSA and the need for additional budgetary allocations to 

upgrade capabilities. Space Command's SSA mission also aims at information 

transparency and "deconfliction."31 To these ends, Space Command shares debris data 

with space users worldwide in the civil, commercial, and military sectors and provides 

space users with modeling and predictions for debris avoidance. Information 

transparency is a tool to deconflict any potential national security issues or threats that the 

debris issue may posit. Deconfliction implies diplomatic and cooperative paths to address 

problems.

The larger issue here is one of space as a commons for peaceful and cooperative purposes 

versus contested space scenarios that involve spacepower projection in the space 

medium. The functional necessity of dealing with the space debris problem to ensure free 

access to and use of space and the civil, commercial, and military benefits that space 

offers advances a cooperative approach to maintain the peaceful uses of space as the 

status quo. All this is made clear when one considers that fragmentation debris shifts 

linear debris growth patterns to exponential ones assuming no active mitigation measures 
are implemented. The Chinese antisatellite (ASAT) weapons test conducted in January 

2007, which destroyed a Chinese satellite, and the February 2009 collision between an 

operational Iridium satellite and a dysfunctional Russian Cosmos communications 

satellite resulted in thousands of additional debris fragments that can potentially threaten 

space assets. The seriousness of the debris issue is compounded when one realizes the 

time it takes debris to deorbit. For instance, the last debris from U.S. ASAT tests in the 

1980s only deorbited in 2004.

Though the majority of operational and active satellites are impacted by debris, impact 

has occurred without consequence except for the Iridium/Cosmos case mentioned above 

and one additional documented case in 1996 that involved a French satellite and Ariane 

upper rocket body. Modeling of the debris threat has also shown low risk of debris 

impacts on large spacecraft that could cause harm—for example, there is a 1 in 100,000 

chance of debris impact with the space shuttle. This is not to undercut the argument that 

debris is a potential commons problem. The failure to prevent debris proliferation in low 

Earth orbit (LEO) could severely restrict use of the more commonly used orbital paths 

and inclinations. Most experts have indicated that some degree of mitigation is needed in 

LEO and that there is a need for improved detection and modeling of the risks.32 The 

latter issue is one very central to spacepower as manifested in freedom of action in space 

and SSA and the need to upgrade debris tracking capabilities as denoted earlier. Further, 

the debris issue in geostationary orbit (GEO) is potentially serious and costly, due to the 

relative permanency of orbit (no passive debris removal through orbital decay), narrow 

orbital bands, and the high economic values of GEO slot allocations with lucrative 

footprints on Earth for telecommunications.

The evolution in policy as it relates to orbital debris in the United States emphasizes the 

need to prevent debris proliferation and to take measures, such as SSA enabling debris 

avoidance maneuvers based on potential impact predictions, to reduce the harm that 

debris causes.33 In 1982, NASA and the U.S. Department of Defense (DOD) initiated 

debris mitigation practices, such as passivation of upper rocket bodies and the placement 

of end-of-lifetime GEO satellites in parking orbits outside the GEO orbital band. Since 

1987, DOD policy has been to minimize or reduce accumulation of space debris and to 

mitigate the impact of space debris on missions and operations in space. NASA formed a 

space debris research group in 1993 with the aim of limiting debris generation, and U.S. 

national space policy has also stated positions on the debris issue. Ronald Reagan called 

for all space sectors to prevent debris proliferation, and George H. W. Bush said the 

United States would encourage other spacefaring nations to prevent proliferation. 

Congress has taken this stance since 1991, laying the groundwork for international 

cooperation on debris mitigation guidelines. Bill Clinton called for an extension of debris 

mitigation guidelines to the commercial sector, leading to a requirement in the U.S. 

licensing process for commercial space launch vehicles and commercial remote sensing 

for operators to submit and adhere to debris mitigation plans. George W. Bush reiterated 

all these positions in his 2006 national space policy.34

The functional necessity of addressing the debris issue advances collective action. This is 

no better illustrated than by the information transparency and deconfliction goals of the 
U.S. Air Force Space Command. In addition to this, the U.S. Government and foreign 

governments have convened working groups, in particular the Inter-Agency Space Debris 

Coordination Committee (IADC), to identify, plan, and assist in the implementation of 

cooperative activities in space debris research and mitigation options.35 The approach 

taken by the IADC encompasses alternatives ranging from the promulgation of voluntary 

actions that states and industries can take to reduce debris—passivation, parking orbits, 

hardware designs like shielding and fasteners—to the establishment of guidelines and 

standards to govern launch vehicles and their payloads. The IADC has also been 

successful in drawing attention to the issue before the UN Committee on the Peaceful 

Uses of Outer Space (UNCOPUOS) Legal Subcommittee, which has made it an agenda 

item, and there is international interest in formulating orbital debris principles in 

international space law.36 Such a formulation is important as the Outer Space Treaty 

regime deals with space objects that are registered as a legal remedy for dealing with 

liability issues. Hence, questions remain as to how one would determine a legal definition 

of debris, how registration of debris is to be dealt with, and whose debris is causing harm, 

especially if that harm is in the space environment and under a fault-based liability 

regime per the Convention on Registration of Objects Launched into Outer Space of 

1974.

Planetary Defense

Planetary defense deals with the detection and possible mitigation of potentially 

hazardous NEOs. This is central to the question of what role space will play in the 

advancement of life on Earth and in the future of humanity. Planetary defense is 

ultimately about providing for the security of Earth similar to avoiding nuclear war and 

global environmental destruction. The focus in this section is on the link between the 

space enterprise and planetary defense.

Near Earth objects were first discovered in 1932, and the first photographic surveys 

began in the 1960s and 1970s. Of particular concern are potentially hazardous asteroids. 

These are asteroids of 150 m in diameter and larger that approach within 7.5 million 

kilometers (km) of Earth and have the potential for impacting it. The type of event caused 

by a collision between NEOs and Earth is determined by the diameter of the asteroid 

impactor. In the 1980s, geologists established the fact that impacts with global effects 

(asteroids that are 300 m in diameter or larger) have occurred in the past and do take 

place in intervals of as little as 25,000 years.37 Given the typical pattern of collisions that 

scientists have discovered in the history of Earth, the statistical risk of death from NEO 

impacts is the same as that of dying in a passenger aircraft accident and greater than that 

of death from natural disasters like floods and tornados.38

Most of the potentially hazardous NEOs travel in predictable orbits and can be detected 

decades in advance. One important issue surrounding NEOs deals with political support 

for detection and surveying efforts and with governance and authority over them. An 

arrangement aimed at more systematic detection and surveying began in 1988 with the 

Spacewatch survey, which involved detection efforts ongoing at NASA and a network of 

amateur astronomers. In 1989, detection efforts documented a NEO near-miss with Earth. 
This led to political advocacy before the U.S. Congress that resulted in a NASA 

Multiyear Authorization Act of 1990 that called for NASA to increase the detection rate 

of NEOs on an international basis. Following this, in 1991, the House Committee on 

Science and Technology directed NASA to conduct workshops and studies on the issue. 

The findings of the workshops were presented to Congress, and in 1994 the Committee 

on Science and Technology amended the NASA Authorization Act and called for NASA 

to cooperate with DOD and foreign national space agencies to identify and catalogue 

within 10 years potentially hazardous NEOs greater than 1 km in diameter.

The plan to carry out identification and cataloguing, known as the Spaceguard survey, 

was initiated by NASA in 1998 in cooperation with U.S. Space Command Space 

Surveillance Networks. As of May 2009, NASA had identified 6,242 NEOs and the 

orbits of 1,047 potentially hazardous asteroids.39 However, NEOs between 150 m and 1 

km can have global effects.40 As such, a new program was called for in the NASA 

Authorization Act of 2005 to detect, track, catalogue, and characterize the physical 

characteristics of NEOs larger than 140 m in size, with the goal to achieve 90 percent 

completion of the survey by 2020. In 2007, NASA studied the option of such a program 

and determined that at current budgetary allocations, it can continue to fund the 

Spaceguard program through 2012, but it cannot initiate a new program as suggested in 

the 2005 Authorization Act.41 Obviously, budgetary allocations and priorities are not 

congruous with what is directed by policy and what is needed to provide for a more 

robust planetary defense mission. This also begs the question of who is in charge of such 

a mission.

The political evolution of the NEO issue demonstrates problems of authority and 

governance. NASA has taken the lead on this and cooperates with DOD for detection, but 

no one has authority over the problem.42 No U.S. agency—not NASA, DOD, Air Force 

Space Command, or the Department of Homeland Security—has been assigned the 

mission of planetary defense. There are no formal plans or procedures to deal with the 

NEO issue as it relates to mitigation or to counter the fallout from an impact. This raises 

the concern of whether planetary defense should be a DOD mission.43 In other words, 

should DOD assume a mission to secure the global commons in relation to NEOs, as 

figure 13–1 below suggests? If this was the case, then should this be part of the calculus 

with spacepower projection? Is it logical to include in counterspace operations the 

possible deployment of space weapons, even the use of standoff nuclear weapons, for 

planetary defense? These are questions that require answers within the context of 

spacepower theory development.

Figure 13–1. Challenges of the Security Environment

Source: Developed by Eligar Sadeh; adapted and updated from Department of Defense, 

Quadrennial Defense Review Report (Washington, DC: Department of Defense, 2006), 

19.
The nature of space as a commons does set up the NEO issue as one of collective action. 

Evidence of this exists with international efforts on the issue. For example, in 1995 and 

1999, the United Nations hosted workshops on NEOs. The Spacewatch and Spaceguard 

survey programs noted above entail international efforts, and Europe has put forward a 

long-term policy commitment on NEOs. More recently, in April 2009, the International 

Academy of Astronautics held a planetary defense conference.44 Although these 

international efforts lack any formal mechanism for cooperation, they do not attempt to 

coordinate a common or collective view to planetary defense. The NEO subject has also 

been discussed at UNCOPUOS meetings,45 and the space preservation treaty efforts that 

have been part of the UN Prevention of an Arms Race in Outer Space process through the 

UN Conference on Disarmament have at times made the point that one caveat should be 

to allow for space weapons for planetary defense.46

This possible caveat raises interesting tensions among space weapons use, orbital debris, 

and planetary defense. Earlier, the rational argument was that mitigating orbital debris 

demands that weapons not be deployed, limiting spacepower projection and counterspace 

operations. Here, the argument is that space weapons may in fact be one option to 

provide for planetary defense. If this option is realized, can space weapons technologies 

be managed as to provide for a "common good?" Could this common good notion be 

extended to legitimize the use of space weapons for collective security? And is it 
legitimate for the United States to deploy space weapons to facilitate its role as a systems 

administrator?

These questions deal with the search for schemes to manage space weapons technologies 

as part of any spacepower calculus. Philosophical debates on the problems associated 

with managing technology emanate from a schism between techne and logos. Ideally, 

technology—as a combination of logos, meaning reason or study, and techne, meaning 

the production of something, the skill or the method—implies an articulate thinking 

turned toward production and making. In these terms, technology is the thinking of 

technique, while technique is the productive transformation of that thinking. What is 

obvious with technique is that it may be lacking logos or reason and thinking. Since the 

technique (that is, the operational understanding and application) for space weapons 

exists, an interesting question that requires answers emerges. Will space weapons 

techniques become the driving power for space weapons development and use, or will a 

logos guide the use and development of space weapons technologies to the benefit of 

humankind?47

Planetary Protection 

An important issue within the context of the environmental theme of this chapter is to 

spread life in a responsible fashion throughout the solar system. A failure to take 

environmental considerations into account could lead to a scenario whereby civil, 

commercial, and military uses of space produce a new extraterrestrial environmental 

crisis. A useful way of ascertaining the evolution of environmental considerations in 

space is illustrated in figure 13–2. There is a continuous evolving system in which 

concepts of environmental protection beyond humans are extended to all animals, plants, 

entire ecosystems, the Earth, and finally to the entire cosmos. In this regard, three distinct 

views on planetary protection are identified and discussed: anthropocentric, biocentric, 

and cosmocentric.

Figure 13–2. Space and Environmental Considerations
In the anthropocentric view, humans are treated as ends in and of themselves and act as 

moral agents in relation to the environment. Nature is of instrumental value in that it 

contributes to human life. Anthropocentrism is rooted in the principle of nature as a 

utility for human ends. In this vein, the environment can be both exploited and protected 

to safeguard and further human interests and the persistence of human civilization.

The exploitation-of-nature argument is based on the exploitation of the environment to 

enhance human well being. This view allows humans to extract resources from space and 

planetary bodies and to create human-supported biospheres in space and on planetary 

surfaces and terraform celestial bodies. In the realm of national security, such a view 

suggests spacepower projection without regard for the contamination of the space 

environment. This is the unregulated view that can lead to a tragedy of the commons of 

space. The perpetuation of the human species that is linked to spacepower considerations 

suggests that extending a human presence in space takes place without regard for 

environmental protection.48

The exploitation-of-nature argument underlies the view on spacepower discussed in 

chapter 9 in this book, which examines the use of the Moon's resources for national 

economic development. Indicative of this is the new U.S. policy "to incorporate the Solar 

System in our economic sphere," with the fundamental goal of exploration being to 

advance scientific, security, and economic interests through a robust space exploration 

program.49
The protection-of-nature argument begins to limit the extent to which resources in space 

can be incorporated exclusively into the U.S. economic sphere. The argument is that the 

environment needs to be protected, not because it has intrinsic value of its own, but to 

safeguard human ends. Environmental protection of some sort is consequently promoted 

due to instrumental ends that include preventing contamination of planets hospitable to 

life forms for scientific inquiry;50 conserving natural resources in space for economic 

development purposes (that is, a measured distribution of resources so that all can partake 

and benefit); preserving resources for future generations; preserving aesthetics of 

planetary surfaces and interplanetary space for human enjoyment; and mitigating 

environmental contamination, such as orbital debris, to ensure freedom of action in space. 

International space law is in congruence with these views and designates space and 

celestial bodies as common resources to be protected from contamination by 

anthropogenic activities.

Indicative of international space law and environmental protection are the planetary 

protection provisions advanced by the International Council for Science Committee on 

Space Research (COSPAR), with the first formal guidelines established in 1969 and most 

recently updated in 2005. COSPAR planetary protection policies are directed at fulfilling 

the provisions of the 1967 Outer Space Treaty to avoid the harmful contamination of the 

Moon and other celestial bodies, with foremost thought given to preserving the scientific 

integrity of planetary bodies. These policies set the context for NASA's planetary 

protection policies that establish formal guidelines for planetary protection and stipulate 

that NASA will not participate in international missions unless all partners agree to 

follow COSPAR's planetary protection policies. COSPAR also formed a panel on 

planetary protection that is concerned with the development, maintenance, and 

promulgation of planetary protection knowledge, policy, and plans to prevent the harmful 

effects of biological contamination on celestial bodies.

Both the biocentric and cosmocentric views are informative for what they may imply for 

the use of space. However, they are theoretical in that the anthropocentric view 

dominates space policy and spacepower projection calculations. This is due in part to the 

fact that the further one departs from anthropocentrism toward biocentrism and 

cosmocentrism, the greater is the constraint on human freedom of action within the space 

environment.51 The biocentric dimension is based on maximizing the well being of the 

totality of living existence. With this approach, value is assigned to all of living biology. 

From this vantage point, humanity has a direct obligation to the welfare of that biology. 

By way of illustration, the need to maintain and value extraterrestrial indigenous life

forms would take precedence over the right of life from Earth to exploit and destroy those 

life forms. This notion is rooted in the principle of the value of life. Humans have a 

responsibility to respect and support the interests of life whether animal, biota, or 

microbes. This is an extension of the aim to preserve the scientific integrity of planetary 

bodies discussed above, but with a value or ethical commitment to that end that 

transcends the anthropocentric view.

The logical extension of biocentrism is a cosmocentric ethic characterized by the entirety 

of the cosmos as an environmental priority. An intrinsic value permeates all levels of 
both ecological and geomorphological hierarchies; all "named" features and those yet to 

be discovered have an inherent right to exist. This view is rooted in the principle of the 

sanctity of existence. Behavior under such a system involves nonviolation of the 

extraterrestrial environment and the preservation of its existing state, whether that state is 

biological, ecological, or geomorphological. On a more practical level, a cosmocentric 

ethic implies that environmental considerations directly inform and determine the 

planning for the exploration and development of the solar system and any spacepower 

projection considerations. An extension of the concept of environmental security to 

spacepower is one practical implication of this view.

Conclusion

The conclusion of this chapter highlights the implications of viewing spacepower through 

the lens of environmental factors. One implication broadens the scope of spacepower 

from a focus solely on national concerns to include regional and global concerns. While 

global environmental dangers and their environmental security aspects—orbital debris, 

planetary defense, and planetary protection—are all issues that affect national security 

considerations, they are at the same time issues that posit a collective action problem and 

require collective action solutions. The collective action solutions discussed herein—

international environmental laws, international laws that limit military activities in space, 

orbital debris mitigation guidelines, planetary defense detection programs, and planetary 

protection policies—offer paths for viewing spacepower through cooperation, rules of the 

road, and ultimately, collective security arrangements.

A second implication extends the scope of spacepower through the incorporation of 

environmental factors into spacepower projection. Remote sensing directed at Earth 

observations links spacepower to that of identifying, tracking, and assessing global 

environmental dangers that underlie environmental security. A role, then, for the 

projection of spacepower is to provide the means for global stability (that is, systems 

administration) by working to mitigate environmental factors that can cause instability 

and conflict between and within states. The example of orbital debris as it relates to the 

space situational awareness mission exemplifies an inclusion of environmental issues in 

spacepower. The extent to which space situational awareness can be tied to planetary 

defense is an issue for spacepower projection. Planetary protection plays a possible role 

in the spacepower calculus, since contamination is a topic that links to environmental 

security, especially if contamination of Earth occurs from space. It is also a subject that is 

tied to realizing freedom of action in space, since contamination of the space environment 

needs to be mitigated if free access to and free use of space are to be ensured.

The final implication within the context of the chapter relates to a strategic view on 

spacepower. From a strategic "high ground" perspective, spacepower is ultimately about 

space control that involves control of cislunar space. Due to geography, technological 

advantage, and global strategic and economic power positions, the United States 

historically has had far greater success in, reach to, and reliance on cislunar space than 

any other state. This suggests that space control is more than just a focus on Earth-bound, 

geocentric strategies like counterspace operations, responsive space, and control of low 
Earth orbit, to an integrated strategy based upon building long-term, unconstrained 

security in cislunar space and in the solar system.52 The development of spacepower to 

achieve this end would undoubtedly need to take into account the environmental issues 

that were the themes of this chapter.

Notes

1. This definition is derived by the author from Environmental Security Studies at 

<www.acunu.org/millennium/env-sec1.html>.

2. For a list of some of these groups, see table 13–3 in this chapter.

3. Gerald B. Thomas, "U.S. Environmental Security Policy: Broad Concern or Narrow Interests," 

Journal of Environment and Development 6, no. 4 (1997).

4. Thomas Friedman, The Lexus and the Olive Tree (New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 1999).

5. Thomas P.M. Barnett, The Pentagon's New Map (New York: G.P. Putnam's Sons, 2004).

6. The CNA Corporation is a nonprofit research organization that operates the Center for Naval 

Analyses and the Institute for Public Research. See <www.cna.org>.

7. Alexander Carius, Melanie Kemper, Sebastian Overturn, and Detlef Sprinz, Environment and 

Security in an International Context: State of the Art and Perspectives (NATO/CCMS Pilot Study, 

October 1996); The CNA Corporation, National Security and the Threat of Climate Change, 2007, 

available at <http://securityandclimate.cna.org>.

8. National Security and the Threat of Climate Change, Executive Summary.

9. "Each man [actor] is locked into a system [an international system] that compels him [the 

individual actor] to increase his herd [to use, obtain collective good] without limit—in a world that 

is limited. Ruin is the destination toward which all men [actors] rush, each pursuing his own best 

interest [self-interest based on rational choice, actor model] in a society [an international system] 

that believes in the freedom of the commons [free access and free use of the commons]. Freedom 

in a commons brings ruin [tragedy] to all." Garrett Hardin, "The Tragedy of the Commons," 

Science 162 (1968).

10. See Theresa Hitchens, Future Society in Space: Charting a Cooperative Course (Washington, DC: 

Center for Defense Information, September 2004).

11. See <hwww.unep.org>.

12. Gro Harlem Bruntland, ed., Our Common Future: The World Commission on Environment and 

Development (Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press, 1987).

13. See <www.un.org/esa/sustdev/documents/agenda21/index.htm>.

14. See <http://ozone.unep.org> and <http://unfccc.int>.

15. The Outer Space Treaty declares space as the "province of all mankind." As a province, space is 

viewed as res nullius, that is, belonging to no one (non-appropriable), open to free use and access, 

and subject to limited claims, like right of use for specific orbital slots for telecommunications 

purposes. The Moon Agreement's declaration of the Moon as the "Common Heritage of Mankind" 

differs in that it establishes the natural resources of the Moon as a common property resource for 

all mankind. If this is accepted, the Moon Agreement requires that lunar resources, once 

exploitation commences, be shared equitably through an international arrangement, such as an 

international regime. For an analogous approach that is an accepted part of international law, see 

the International Seabed Authority at <www.isa.org.jm/en/home>.

16. See <www.gcrio.org/gcact1990.html> and <www.usgcrp.gov/usgcrp>.

17. See <http://eos.nasa.gov>.

18. United Nations, Article XII, Principles Relating to Remote Sensing of the Earth from Outer Space, 

adopted December 3, 1986.

19. The membership of CEOS includes national space agencies and space-based research 

organizations of Australia, Brazil, Canada, China, France, Germany, India, Italy, Japan, Russia, 

Sweden, Ukraine, United Kingdom, and the United States. Belgium, Canada, New Zealand, and 
Norway are observers; and affiliates include the Economic and Social Commission of Asia and 

Pacific, Food and Agricultural Organization, Global Climate Observing System, Global Ocean 

Observing System, Intergovernmental Oceanographic Commission, International Council of 

Scientific Unions, International Geosphere-Biosphere Program, United Nations Environmental 

Program, United Nations Office of Outer Space Affairs, World Climate Program, and World 

Meteorological Organization. 

20. For the issues of mission coordination and the relevant actors and data policy issues, see Eligar 

Sadeh, "Harmonization of Earth Observation Data: Global Change and Collective Action 

Conflict," Astropolitics: International Journal of Space Politics and Policy 3, no. 2 (2005).

21. Gerald B. Thomas, James P. Lester, and Willy Z. Sadeh, "International Cooperation in Remote 

Sensing for Global Change Research: Political and Economic Considerations," Space Policy 1, no. 

2 (1995).

22. Sadeh, "Harmonization of Earth Observation Data."

23. Committee on Earth Observation Satellites toward an Integrated Global Observing Strategy, 1997 

Yearbook (Surrey, UK: Smith System Engineering Limited, 1997).

24. Earth remote sensed data have the potential to engender sovereignty transparency and the 

"unbundling of territoriality." For a further discussion on this unbundling concept and 

international relations, see John G. Ruggie, "Territoriality and Beyond: Problematizing Modernity 

in International Relations," International Organization 47, no. 1 (1993).

25. Michael R. Hoversten, "U.S. National Security and Government Regulation of Commercial 

Remote Sensing from Outer Space," Air Force Law Review50 (Winter 2001).

26. Attempting to clarify when shutter control might occur, the memorandum of understanding states: 

"Conditions should be imposed for the smallest area and for the shortest period necessary to 

protect national security [defense and intelligence], international obligations, or foreign policy 

concerns at issue. Alternatives to prohibitions on collection and/or distribution shall be considered 

such as delaying the transmission or distribution of data, restricting the field of view of the system, 

encryption of the data if available, or other means to control the use of the data." U.S. President, 

National Science and Technology Council, "Fact Sheet: Regarding the Memorandum of 

Understanding Concerning the Licensing of Private Remote Sensing Satellite Systems," 

November 1, 2001.

27. Orbimage acquired Space Imaging, and the company today is named GeoEye. 

28. The facts suggest that there may be no choice but for the U.S. military to accept certain 

sovereignty bargains, which implies constraints and limits on the use of spacepower projection. 

An important argument that emerges from this conclusion has to do with what set of constraints is 

acceptable. For example, is the body of international space law and other international agreements 

that limit military uses of space as explained in this chapter a sufficient set of constraints, or will 

the sovereignty bargain force other constraints, like "rules of the road" that could impact the use of 

spacepower to preserve freedom of action in space?

29. Molly K. Macauley, "Economics of Space," in Space Politics and Policy: An Evolutionary 

Perspective, ed. Eligar Sadeh (The Netherlands: Kluwer Academic Publishers, 2002).

30. Hitchens, Future Society in Space; and author correspondence with General James E. Cartwright, 

USMC, Commander, U.S. Strategic Command, Space and Telecommunications Law Conference, 

University of Nebraska, Lincoln, Nebraska, March 2, 2007.

31. Author correspondence, General James E. Cartwright. 

32. See, for example, Technical Report on Space Debris (New York: United Nations, 1999).

33. Attaining zero debris growth, or even cleaning up all debris to achieve zero debris, is likely to be 

prohibitively expensive and may well require cessation of doing anything in space. Further, it 

probably is not economically practical or technically feasible. Pinpointing a "livable" amount of 

debris requires a comprehensive social benefit and cost calculus, informed by engineering data 

about debris populations and their probable growth over time, to weigh the benefits of space 

activity against the costs of debris production and mitigation. Finally, debris issues, like all space 

activity, are inherently global. Choosing the best way to manage debris requires the consensus of 

all parties: those now using space, those who will use space in the future, and those who may 

never use space directly but who indirectly benefit from space activity. Macauley, "Economics of 

Space," in Sadeh, ed., Space Politics and Policy.
34. U.S. National Space Policy, August 31, 2006, available at 

<www.ostp.gov/html/US%20National%20Space%20Policy.pdf>, states:

Orbital debris poses a risk to continued reliable use of space-based services and operations and to 

the safety of persons and property in space and on Earth. The United States shall seek to minimize 

the creation of orbital debris by government and non-government operations in space in order to 

preserve the space environment for future generations. Toward that end: Departments and 

agencies shall continue to follow the United States Government Orbital Debris Mitigation 

Standard Practices, consistent with mission requirements and cost effectiveness, in the 

procurement and operation of spacecraft, launch services, and the operation of tests and 

experiments in space; the Secretaries of Commerce and Transportation, in coordination with the 

Chairman of the Federal Communications Commission, shall continue to address orbital debris 

issues through their respective licensing procedures; and the United States shall take a leadership 

role in international fora to encourage foreign nations and international organizations to adopt 

policies and practices aimed at debris minimization and shall cooperate in the exchange of 

information on debris research and the identification of improved debris mitigation practices.

35. IADC members include British National Space Centre, Centre National d'Etudes Spatiales, China 

National Space Administration, European Space Agency, German Aerospace Center, Indian Space 

Research Organisation, Italian Space Agency, Japan, NASA, National Space Agency of Ukraine, 

and the Russian Federal Space Agency. Also see <www.iadc-online.org>.

36. One potential obstacle to any new formulation in international space law has to do with the U.S. 

concern that any "new" legal agreements could limit U.S. military options and spacepower 

projection. The National Space Policy issued in October 2006 clearly states that the "United States 

will oppose the development of new legal regimes or other restrictions that seek to prohibit or 

limit U.S. access to or use of space." See U.S. National Space Policy. 

37. Report of the Task Force on Potentially Hazardous Near Earth Objects, September 2000, 

available at <www.nearearthobjects.co.uk/report/resources_task_intro.cfm>.

38. Clark R. Chapman, "The Hazard of Near-Earth Asteroid Impacts on Earth," Earth and Planetary 

Science Letters 222 (2004).

39. See <http://neo.jpl.nasa.gov>.

40. Report of the Task Force on Potentially Hazardous Near Earth Objects.

41. National Aeronautics and Space Administration, "Near-Earth Object Survey and Deflection 

Analysis of Alternatives," report to Congress, March 2007.

42. Peter Garretson and Douglas Kaupa, Planetary Defense: Potential Department of Defense 

Mitigation Roles (Colorado Springs: U.S. Air Force Academy, December 2006).

43. The U.S. Air Force recently conducted an interagency exercise dealing with a scenario of a near 

Earth object (NEO) impact with Earth. See AF/A8XC Natural Impact Hazard (Asteroid Strike) 

Interagency Deliberate Planning Exercise After Action Report (December 2008). The major 

insights of this effort include: the NEO impact scenario is not captured in existing plans; the NEO 

impact scenario should be elevated to higher level exercises with more senior government players; 

proper planning and response to a NEO emergency requires delineation of organizational 

responsibilities including lead agency and notification standards; government players were not 

able to achieve consensus on which agency should lead the NEO deflection/mitigation effort; there 

is a deficit in software tools to support senior decisionmaking and strategic communication for 

disaster response and mitigation for a NEO scenario; there are significant regional and global 

effects a NEO impact would generate that are not adequately captured in existing models; the 

public may be aware of an impending NEO impact before senior decisionmakers; lead time for 

evacuation requires decisions be made before best information is available; public safety and 

tranquility require that the U.S. Government be able to rapidly establish a single authoritative 

voice and tools to present critical information; and the preferred approach for short-notice NEO 

deflection was standoff nuclear.

44. See <www.congrex.nl/09c04/>. The 2009 conference discussed detecting and tracking NEO 

asteroids and comets that might be hazardous to Earth, physical characteristics of NEOs, 
deflecting a threatening NEO should one be detected, the nature of impact disasters, and political, 

legal, and policy issues that must be considered as part of an overall mitigation strategy.

45. See <www.b612foundation.org>.

46. The use of any technology to counter the threat of NEO impacts has to consider the lead time 

before impact and the physical type and characteristics of the NEO. Whether a space weapon or 

another type of technology could be effective is a matter of debate in the space community. 

47. Everett C. Dolman, in Astropolitik: Classical Geopolitics in the Space Age (London: Frank Cass, 

2002), argues for spacepower projection by the United States to safeguard and advance its values 

of freedom and democracy.

48. Molly K. Macauley, "Environmentally Sustainable Human Space Activities: Can Challenges of 

Planetary Protection Be Reconciled," Astropolitics: International Journal of Space Politics and 

Policy 5, no. 3 (2007).

49. John Marburger, keynote address, 44th Robert H. Goddard Memorial Symposium, Greenbelt, MD, 

March 15, 2006, available at <www.spaceref.com/news/viewsr.html?pid=19999>. 

50. NASA has addressed some of these issues by establishing a Planetary Protection Office and 

instituting policy guidelines regarding planetary protection. These guidelines incorporate both 

"forward" and "backward" contamination issues. Forward contamination seeks to prevent Earth 

organisms from contaminating another celestial body, and possible backward contamination is 

contamination forthcoming from another planet to Earth.

51. Eligar Sadeh, "Space and the Environment," in Sadeh, ed., Space Politics and Policy.

52. Thomas Cremins and Paul D. Spudis, "The Strategic Context of the Moon: Echoes of the Past, 

Symphony of the Future," Astropolitics: International Journal of Space Politics and Policy 5, no. 

1 (2007). The cislunar perspective also informs the development of this spacepower theory 

project. Dennis Wingo argues in chapter 9 in this book that a geocentric mindset has become an 

embedded assumption in the development of national spacepower theory. Geocentric is defined as 

a mindset that sees spacepower and its application as focused primarily on actions, actors, and 

influences on Earthly powers, the Earth itself, and its nearby orbital environs. Wingo argues that 

this is a mindset and worldview that must be expanded in the development of spacepower theory. 

The expanded view can be defined as cislunar based on a "cosmographic" outlook. See 

presentation by Charles D. Lutes, "Towards a Theory of Spacepower," The Influence of 

Spacepower on History and the Implications for the Future, Institute for National Security 

Studies, National Defense University, Washington, DC, April 25–26, 2007.
Chapter 14:

Neither Mahan nor Mitchell: National Security Space and Spacepower, 1945-2000

James Andrew Lewis

Beginning in the 1950s, the United States extended its military activities into space to 

provide for its defense in a global conflict with the Soviet Union. Over the next four 

decades, the Nation put in place an impressive array of satellites that provided remote 

sensing, communications, and geospatial location services. The first task for these 

military satellites was to obtain strategic information that neither aircraft nor human 

agents could access. The development of other space services (in communications and 

navigation) enabled a responsive global defense. Over time, the data and services 

provided by satellites became an integral part of U.S. military operations and of national 

power. The salient points of the history of this effort can be summarized as follows: 

• In 1944, German scientists build and launch medium-range, suborbital missiles 

against Allied targets and begin to design an intercontinental missile for use 

against the United States. At the end of the war, the Soviets and Americans coopt 

scientists and seize missiles and factories and incorporate them into their own 

national military programs.

• In 1945, Army Air Force Commander Hap Arnold recommends to the Secretary 

of War that the United States pursue the development of long-range missiles and 

"space ships" capable of launching missiles against terrestrial targets. 

• The RAND Corporation, at the request of General Curtis LeMay, issues a report 

in 1946 on the "Preliminary Design of an Experimental World Circling 

Spaceship." The Navy and Army begin programs to develop launch capabilities 

and satellites.

• In 1957, embarrassed by the launch of Sputnik and the shooting down of a U–2 

reconnaissance aircraft over the Soviet Union, the United States manages (after 13 

consecutive failures) to launch the Corona reconnaissance satellite, opening the 

era of spacepower as a component of strategic military power. Satellite 

reconnaissance solves an immediate and pressing national security problem: the 

U.S. inability to infiltrate the Soviet Union with agents. After a delay, Corona is 

followed by the first U.S. electronic intelligence satellite.

• For the next 30 years, driven by its conflict with the Soviet Union, the United 

States refines and expands the range of satellite services available to support 

national security to include military communications, navigation and timing, 

intelligence collection, and reconnaissance. 

• Sputnik also prompts the United States to reorganize its national space effort, and 

the organizational steps taken between 1958 and 1962 shape how America will 

operate in space. The 1958 National Aeronautics and Space Act splits the U.S. 

space program into civil and military components and mandates that military 

space activities be conducted by the Department of Defense. The creation of the 
National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) gives space exploration 

a home outside of the military and diverts thousands of engineers from military 

programs. National space security is further divided into military and intelligence 

programs. The National Reconnaissance Office (NRO) is established and given 

oversight of classified programs. President Dwight Eisenhower's decision 

bifurcates the national space effort, and diffusion of responsibility for space 

missions becomes the norm.

• In response to a call from President Eisenhower to the United Nations, an 

international legal framework for space activities is created in the 1960s. This 

allows satellites to operate freely over other nations. There are parallels to 

international law as applied to the sea and to warships but also some significant 

differences. National sovereignty does not extend limitlessly into space, and the 

right of overflight is established. There is significant ambiguity over the use of 

weapons—nuclear weapons and other weapons of mass destruction are clearly 

forbidden; other classes of weapons are not. 

• Secretary of Defense Robert McNamara attempts to streamline organization and 

budgetary oversight for national security space within the Department of Defense 

(DOD). He designates the Air Force as the Executive Agent for Space (the 

decision was rescinded in 1970 and then restored in 2003), but the other Services 

continue their own space programs, and early proposals to create a separate 

command for space fall victim to Service rivalries.

• Threats by Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev to deploy nuclear-armed orbital 

bombardment systems lead in 1959 to the first U.S. antisatellite program. The 

Soviets begin similar programs and deploy a system in the early 1970s. U.S. 

efforts to develop antisatellite weapons are helped by work on missile defense and 

hindered by concerns over the legality of such weapons.

• McNamara cancels the Air Force X–20 space plan project in 1963, citing 

budgetary concerns and lack of a clear mission. This is a seminal moment for 

spacepower and diverts it from the vision of Arnold and other Air Force pioneers. 

Manned flight becomes the domain of NASA, and the United States shelves the 

idea of an aircraft-like manned platform capable of delivering weapons from 

orbit.

• The United States flirts with the idea of manned orbital military missions in the 

1970s, but the Air Force's planned Manned Orbital Laboratory (conceived as a 

replacement to the cancelled X–20) is rapidly abandoned as impractical.

• A key development for spacepower occurs in 1976, when real-time imagery from 

space becomes available. Instead of dropping film canisters for aerial recovery, 

reconnaissance satellites convert images into electronic signals and relay them to 

Earth in near real time. The change ultimately allows for the creation of software 

to refine and better exploit imagery and creates the possibility for tactical 

application of dynamic (rather than stored) imagery. 

• In another effort to improve coordination among Air Force, Navy, and Army 

space efforts, the United States establishes in 1985 a new joint command, the 

United States Space Command (merged into the U.S. Strategic Command in 

2003). The new unified command is part of the sweeping U.S. military 
reorganization aimed at improving inter-Service cooperation prompted by the 

Goldwater-Nichols Act Department of Defense Reorganization Act.

• In 1986, the Challenger shuttle explosion prompts DOD to restart its own launch 

programs, reversing the earlier U.S. policy to rely solely on the shuttle for access 

to space.1 In 1994, the White House makes DOD the lead agency for expendable 

launch vehicles.

• In the 1991 Persian Gulf War, the United States discovers, almost by accident, 

that it has assembled a collection of space services that provide real advantages on 

the battlefield.The operation of space assets and the delivery of their services are 

poorly integrated from the combatant commander's point of view, but space 

provides new capabilities and improved performance. The successful use of space 

assets in the Gulf reflects earlier efforts to improve joint operations, such as the 

changes prompted by the Goldwater-Nichols Act, and to emphasize intangible 

factors—information superiority and coordination—in gaining military 

superiority over the massive forces of the Soviet Union.

• The end of the Cold War eliminates the peer competition that drove much of the 

change in military and intelligence activities in space. While the budget and 

personnel cuts that follow the end of the conflict damage U.S. space and 

intelligence capabilities, DOD begins to articulate a broader concept of 

spacepower and begins to change organizations and doctrine to take full 

advantage of space for national security.

• In 1995, after prompting from Congress, DOD again reorganizes to improve 

management and unity of effort in space. As part of this complex reorganization, 

it creates a Deputy Under Secretary of Defense for Space, a Joint Space 

Management Board, and the position of Space Architect. DOD releases the first 

Space Architecture, for military communications, in 1996. Perhaps the best 

comment on the reorganization effort is that 3 years later, Congress feels 

compelled to create another commission to assess and recommend changes for the 

management and organization of national security space.

• The United States declassifies the existence of the National Reconnaissance 

Office (NRO) in 1992 and releases thousands of Corona photographs. Space 

becomes routine rather than exotic and experimental; for example, the National 

Commission to Review the National Reconnaissance Office lamented in 2000 that 

"most unfortunately, the NRO no longer commands the personal attention of the 

President, the Secretary of Defense, the DCI [Director of Central Intelligence], or 

senior White House officials."

• In 1996, a new agency, the National Imagery and Mapping Agency (NIMA), is 

established. NIMA combines DOD and Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) 

personnel in order to better exploit and coordinate spatial intelligence. U.S. policy 

(in documents such as Presidential Decision Directive 23 on Remote Sensing) 

begins to plan for the increased use of commercial space services as a means to 

reinforce the services provided by government-owned satellites for national 

security purposes. 

• Frustrated by continued duplication and slow progress in space programs, and 

prompted by an awareness of the increased importance of space for security, 

Congress uses the National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2000 to 
create the Commission to Assess United States National Security Space 

Management and Organization. In its final report, the Commission concludes that 

"we are now on the threshold of a new era of the space age, devoted to mastering 

operations in Space."2 The United States leads all other nations in the use of space 

for national security, but problems in organization that date back to 1958 and the 

acquisition of new systems threaten to erode its advantage. 

This brief summary reveals several crucial trends. The first is the interconnection 

between larger developments in warfighting and strategy and the use of space. The 

second is the diffusion of control and its implications for the pursuit of unity of effort, not 

only among the armed Services, but also between the military and the Intelligence 

Community. The third is the tendency to build spacecraft for a specific function or 

mission rather than as part of a larger military goal (like air superiority or sea control). 

Finally, the refinement and elaboration of space services allow the United States to 

refocus military space activities from a national/strategic to an operational/tactical level, 

creating new combat capabilities but also creating new tensions over who controls space 

assets and services: Washington or the combatant commander.These trends have shaped 

U.S. security efforts in space.

Although the benefits of space for national security are widely celebrated, the United 

States has struggled from the onset with the organizational and doctrinal changes required 

to make full use of space for military purposes. The Nation faces three difficult problems 

that grow directly out of the history of its military and intelligence programs: the lack of a 

coherent architecture for the many independent national security space systems; changes 

in the acquisitions process that slow new programs; and the challenge of articulating a 

theory of spacepower equal to sea- or airpower when satellite systems do not deliver 

force or firepower from space.

This summary also suggests that while it can be useful to consider the U.S. experience in 

developing sea- and airpower concepts, these can be imprecise guides for spacepower. In 

some ways, the naval experience, with its mix of commercial and military activities and 

the operations of fleets on the high seas, may be the best precedent. But if Alfred Thayer 

Mahan is the foundation for strategic thinking on seapower, he built upon centuries of 

experience with naval conflict and its relations to national power, and he looked 

explicitly at the 300 years of fleet operations amassed by the Royal Navy. The 

development of airpower offers a tempting set of precedents, but there are crucial 

differences between airpower and spacepower: spacecraft do not fly, they do not deliver 

weapons onto targets, and the legal regime for offensive space operations is both 

markedly different from air operations and untested.

The concept of a space architecture is crucial for understanding the development of 

national security space systems. Architecture defines structure, equipment, and operations 

and can be a roadmap for investment and development. Architecture is particularly 

important for space, given the physics of orbital operations, which dictate static patterns 

for movement and position. In this sense, architecture is somewhat comparable to the 
concept of order of battle.The most important point to bear in mind about a national 

security space architecture for the United States is that until the 1990s, there was none.

An Incremental Approach to Spacepower

In competition with the Soviet Union, the United States assembled an array of sensorbearing, communications, and geonavigational satellites to support its ability to fight a 

global war.The triumvirate of spacepower—sensors, communications, and navigation—

markedly increased U.S. security in the decades after Corona and ultimately provided the 

tools for a new approach to warfare, an approach that emphasized intangible advantage 

and information superiority. However, the United States undertook the construction of 

these space systems without a coherent vision for space and in an environment shaped by 

inter-Service rivalries. Services The United States built satellites because they offered a 

solution to a particular problem or a better way of carrying out an existing mission, not as 

part of some larger strategy for space operations.This fragmented approach formed the 

U.S. presence in space.

The absence of a larger vision meant that the development of spacepower was 

incremental. Satellites were useful tools or adjuncts, not the basis for an independent 

service. Nor was space a new arena for combat. Only after the number and kinds of 

satellites had reached critical mass, after U.S. organizational and strategic concepts had 

changed to emphasize intangible factors in military operations—coordination and 

information superiority—and after surprisingly quick success in a conflict against a 

powerful regional foe demonstrated the broader potential of space that the United States 

began to conceptualize the idea of spacepower.

This fragmentation is perhaps indicative of early attitudes about the military utility of 

space. Space was in some ways a microcosm of a larger problem. In the 1950s, when the 

national security space programs began, lines of responsibility and authority among the 

Secretary of Defense, the newly created Air Force, the other Services, and the CIA were 

unclear, and space projects were spread among the various agencies and Services.

The United States had learned the importance of joint operations from its experiences in 

World War II and had begun to reorganize military and intelligence functions to promote 

greater coordination.The vehicle for this reorganization was the 1947 National Security 

Act, which established the National Security Council, the Department of Defense, the 

Joint Chiefs of Staff, and the Central Intelligence Agency. The intent of Congress was to 

create "a comprehensive program . . . to provide for the establishment of integrated 

policies and procedures for the departments, agencies, and functions of the Government 

relating to the national security." The act envisioned "the integration of domestic, foreign, 

and military policies relating to the national security."It has taken years (some would say 

decades) to implement this vision. Military space activities began at the same moment the 

United States was wrestling with the larger question of how to integrate its military, 

intelligence, diplomatic, and economic power to achieve national security.
Yet while the Armed Forces and intelligence agencies were being subsumed within a 

larger integrated management structure, national security space was being fragmented. In 

part, this was due to the newness of the coordinating authorities of the Department of 

Defense.However, the fragmentation also suggests that the planners and strategists of the 

1950s saw space and satellites as tools and accessories rather than as an independent 

military capability, somewhat akin to the way the Army saw aircraft before the First 

World War. An integrated vision of spacepower would advance no faster than the growth 

of an integrated approach to national security and military operations.

At least one service, the Navy, floated the idea of a separate command for space as early 

as 1958. Arleigh Burke, Chief of Naval Operations, proposed the new command, and one 

of his deputies, Admiral John Hayward, the Deputy Chief of Naval Operations for 

Development (and previously the Assistant Chief of Naval Operations for Research and 

Development), was "one of the strongest proponents of a unified national space 

program."3 Navy's interest in space was driven by practical requirements for global 

communications and navigation, and the Service had begun to pursue space operations in 

the late 1940s.

Burke's proposal met with resistance from two quarters. The new Office of the Secretary 

of Defense argued that there were not enough space missions to justify an independent 

command.The Air Force took the position that it "should have primary responsibility for 

any military satellite vehicle, considering such activity to be essentially an extension of 

strategic air power." From the start, Air Force leaders had seen space as an extension of 

airpower and thus rightfully falling in their sphere of control. Efforts by the Air Force to 

assert dominance over space activities became one of the constants of the first 40 years of 

U.S. military space programs. 

McNamara, as part of his larger effort to rationalize the Department of Defense and its 

budget processes, attempted in March 1961 to correct the fragmentation problem by 

making the Air Force the executive agent for military space (his decision was rescinded 

in 1970 and not reinstated until 2003).4 McNamara's directive allowed the other military 

Services to conduct research and development but gave the Air Force oversight and lead 

for space. The other Services, particularly the Navy, were not overly constrained by this 

decision, and their independence may not have been a bad thing. The Navy initially gave 

a higher priority than the Air Force to developing satellite navigational aids, and its 

efforts led to global positioning systems (GPS) being deployed earlier than might have 

otherwise been the case.

The creation of NRO in 1961 was another attempt to overcome coordination 

problems.Eisenhower had assigned the Corona program to CIA rather than the Air Force 

during a time of struggle between the two agencies over control of strategic 

reconnaissance and over what became the U–2 and SR–71 reconnaissance aircraft. NRO 

was to provide a "more formalized and closer coordination" between DOD and CIA for 

space programs.5 When the Eisenhower administration created NRO, vesting a secretive 

civilian agency with the primary responsibility for space programs made sense. There 

were few systems in operation, and they were highly classified. Over time, however, as 
the number of unclassified military space programs grew in number and importance, the 

distinction between "white" and "black" programs only perpetuated the U.S. tendency 

toward duplication and diffusion in space programs. Efforts to align NRO and Air Force 

programs more closely have continued to face the problem of melding the two different 

cultures that grew up around national security space since 1961.

The bifurcation of national security space—as an intelligence activity and as a military 

support activity—has been a source of tension almost from the start of national security 

space activities. Initially, this tension was an outgrowth of the original discomfort of the 

military Services with the creation of the CIA, a civilian intelligence agency that operated 

independent of military command. This tension over control was also reflected in the 

concerns of the different Services that their missions would always receive a lower 

priority if a single Service was vested with control of space missions. 

Control over satellite acquisitions and tasking of space assets was also a problem. While 

the requirements of the military and the Intelligence Community overlap to a 

considerable degree, there are differences. A satellite built for the Intelligence 

Community may not meet the needs of the military, for example; each can have different 

requirements for remote sensing. Efforts in the 1990s to design satellites that met all 

possible requirements had the unintended consequence of slowing new acquisitions and 

making the planned satellites more costly. Tasking and mission priority also remain a 

potential, albeit decreasing, friction point. The United States has put in place 

management structures to resolve disputes over scarce space resources and decide when a 

military request takes precedence over an intelligence tasking, but the dual control over 

national security space continues to complicate development of a unified theory of 

spacepower.

Space as Strategic Support

Intelligence satellites are referred to as "national technical means" of collection, 

reflecting the early emphasis on space as a strategic and national resource. Space 

activities were closely tied to strategic interests: identifying targets for strategic weapons; 

detecting tests, launches, and possible attacks from the Soviet Union; and providing 

global and survivable communications. As a counter to its lack of human resources in the 

Soviet bloc, the United States developed an immense technical collection infrastructure 

that obtained intelligence from signals and imagery. The first contribution of space to 

intelligence lay in photoreconnaissance. Corona provided information on Soviet strategic 

programs that was otherwise unavailable. Over the next two decades, the Nation 

developed and deployed a range of satellite collection systems for intelligence.While 

aerial reconnaissance and collection by numerous ground facilities reinforced spacebased collection, the use of space systems for collection became a hallmark of U.S. 

intelligence activities.

Aerial reconnaissance began as early as the Civil War, and it was easy to think of 

satellites as just an extension of aerial photography into space. In addition to imagery, the 

United States began in the 1960s to operate satellites to collect signals intelligence, to 
provide early warning of missile launches, and to monitor oceans for naval activity. 

Satellites obtained information that neither aircraft nor human agents could access. Over 

the next two decades, these satellites provided U.S. policymakers with a stream of 

information that few, if any, nations could match. 

Gaining military and intelligence advantage from space assets depends on more than the 

possession of satellites. Countries seeking to use satellites for military purposes often 

overlook the expensive terrestrial element of spacepower. Effective use of satellite 

services requires the development of a support infrastructure of analysts and operators, 

and the ability to integrate satellite data and services into military plans and operation. 

The integration of space-based signals intelligence and imagery is a particularly complex 

task since it requires extensive changes to doctrine, expanded staffs, and increased 

communications capabilities. By the 1970s, the United States had developed a strong 

cadre of personnel, both civilian and military, who were capable of planning and carrying 

out operations in space to support national security objectives. Their efforts were 

supported by the development of new analytical tools, including software, that let them 

extract more value from space imagery and other data.

However, the military's struggle with jointness and integration was mirrored in the 

Intelligence Community. As the community grew in size, different cultures appeared in 

the agencies that managed each intelligence collection discipline and associated 

technologies. The disciplines did not integrate well with each other; the 9/11 Commission 

and others would later identify this failure to share intelligence as a key U.S. weakness. 

Only in the past few years, with the successful cooperation between the National Security 

Agency (NSA) and the National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency (NGA; formerly the 

National Imagery and Mapping Agency), have the collection disciplines undertaken a 

sustained effort at integration.

The prominent and foundational role of intelligence collection from space may have 

inadvertently hampered the development of spacepower concepts. The United States 

designed many of its space activities to support the highest levels of civilian and military 

command. In addition to this national focus and the narrow set of customers behind it, 

space programs were highly classified. The codeword classifications and 

compartmentalization covered not only the operational capabilities of the satellites, which 

clearly needed protection if they were not to be rendered ineffective, but also their very 

existence and, in many cases, the information they produced. The clandestine, 

compartmentalized, and restricted nature of the programs worked against unity of action 

or a single theory of spacepower.

The cost of access to space also hampered the development of spacepower concepts. 

Beyond the expense of building the satellite (and intelligence satellites were, as a rule, 

among the most expensive pieces of hardware the United States acquired), the cost of 

space launch was a serious obstacle to taking full advantage of space capabilities. The 

Jimmy Carter administration directed NASA to create a "National Space Transportation 

System" to reduce access costs by employing a reusable vehicle, the space shuttle. For 

the shuttle program to make economic sense, however, it would need to carry a high 
number of payloads. To attain this, Carter directed that all U.S. payloads, including 

national security payloads, would be launched on the shuttle and, more importantly, that 

existing expendable launch vehicles be retired.

Carter's decision was not without precedent. Sporadic and repeated efforts by Congress, 

the White House, or the Secretary of Defense to eliminate duplication are a hallmark of 

the U.S. national space effort. As early as November 1959, the Eisenhower 

administration had decided that a single agency should design and build a "super booster" 

for the "national space program" and that this agency should be NASA. The basis for the 

decision was that there was no clear military requirement for super boosters. The United 

States took the resources and personnel for this program from the Army and the other 

Services.6

If Carter's policy on launches had worked, it would have had serious implications for 

spacepower; it essentially would have meant that the military would no longer control its 

own access to space. However, the policy foundered after the 1986 Challenger explosion 

and the launch of national security payloads for the defense community returned to the 

more robust expendable launch vehicles. This solved the problems of access and 

reliability, but not of cost. The cost of reaching orbit essentially reflects technological and 

scientific limitations, but the expense of putting objects into space remains a major 

obstacle to the further development of spacepower.

The cost of access to space shaped military thinking about spacepower. In the 1950s, 

consistent with the view that space was simply an extension of the atmosphere, the 

United States began programs to create space planes such as the X–20 DynaSoar. This 

was an aircraft that would have been boosted into space by a Titan launch vehicle, where 

it could achieve orbital speed, attack terrestrial and space targets, and then glide back to 

land. Cost and doubts about the X–20's mission led to the cancellation of the project after 

$3.7 billion (in 2007 dollars) were spent and a prototype was completed.

The U.S. decisions not to pursue spacecraft like the X–20 or its follow-on program, the 

Manned Orbital Laboratory, channeled spacepower away from combat and the traditional 

application of force. Developments in long-range missiles made some of the DynaSoar's 

potential missions redundant. DOD also cancelled other manned military systems, such 

as an orbiting military space station, as it considered them too expensive when compared 

with terrestrial or unmanned systems. In some ways, the expense of building a presence 

in space turned out to have some advantages. Space systems were too expensive to 

deploy except in those cases where they alone could perform a crucial task. By default, 

this limitation forced an answer to the question of what it is that can be done in space that 

cannot be done somewhere else.

The contrast with airpower can help to illuminate the nature of military and intelligence 

activities in space. Airpower means that a nation's forces are unhindered in their use of 

the airspace; airpower can support their operations, enemy air forces cannot attack them 

or gain advantage from the air, but the enemy's forces and homeland could be attacked. 

Spacepower could provide all but one of these advantages. The inability to launch attacks 
from space hindered the development of spacepower theory. Sea- and airpower theorists 

can envision their fleets of ships or aircraft being the decisive instrument of victory. Few 

people imagined that for spacepower, and no one attempted to put it into practice.

The original theorists of airpower, Giulio Douhet, Hugh Trenchard, and Billy Mitchell, 

saw it as a new kind of conflict, one that would supplant and surpass previous forms of 

battle.Airpower offered the opportunity to break the stalemate of conventional warfare 

and defeat determined enemies without having to first vanquish their armies and fleets. 

Airpower could bypass trenches, fortifications, and ground forces and strike directly at an 

enemy's will and ability to wage war. These theories appeared in the decade after the 

infantry debacle of the First World War. In contrast, there were no great theorists of 

spacepower in the first decades of the military use of space. If the analogy holds, 

however, we would say that airpower theorists appeared in the decade after the first war 

to see the use of aircraft in combat, so if the 1990 Persian Gulf War was the first space 

war, we should not be surprised to see spacepower theories emerging in the 1990s.

Early proponents of spacepower saw it as an extension of airpower. This was an 

unworkable approach, given the difference between aircraft and spacecraft. The inability 

to "fly" manned weapons platforms in space closed off the easy route to the development

of a theory of spacepower. Instead, the emergence of spacepower was linked to changing 

concepts for joint operations and the influence of intangible elements for military 

effectiveness and national power.

Space and New Approaches to Warfare 

The military aspects of spacepower are an outgrowth of major changes in how the United 

States fights its wars. Defeat in Vietnam brought U.S. military forces to their nadir. From 

the wreckage of the mass mobilization army in the mid-1970s, new concepts of how 

America could apply force against its opponents emerged. The end of the draft meant the 

end of any serious effort to match the Soviet forces on a quantitative basis. As it 

contemplated how to fight outnumbered and win, the Nation would discover that space 

assets could provide a crucial advantage.

The new military would be smaller and professional. It would build on the scientific and 

technological strengths that became part of the American way of fighting in the 

1940s.The incorporation of the scientific establishment into military activity during 

World War II provided U.S. forces with significant advantages in that conflict and the 

United States created a number of research institutions after the war (such as the Defense 

Advanced Research Projects Agency and the various Service Labs) to formalize the 

relationship between science and national security. The Cold War reinforced the 

importance of scientific research to bolster national security and provide technological 

solutions to military problems. The use of space and satellites was closely tied to this 

nexus of national security and science.

The Cold War, with its competition between two different political and economic 

systems, engendered a number of races to win prestige and international political support. 
More importantly, as it became apparent that the United States would not be able to 

match the quantitative advantage the Soviet bloc had in the numbers of tanks, aircraft, 

missiles, and other weapons, American strategists turned to the idea of qualitative 

advantage as the key to defeating a conventional attack by the Soviets. The ability of the 

arsenal of democracy to out-manufacture the Axis powers had been one of the avenues to 

victory in World War II. The Soviet fixation on military production closed off this 

avenue by the 1970s. 

Confronted by massive Soviet forces, American military thinking shifted in the 1980s to 

concepts where a high-tech force that obtained information and acted upon it faster than 

its opponents was more likely to win in combat. The emphasis on information superiority 

allows the most effective use of high-tech weapons, making American forces far more 

lethal today than their predecessors of 20 to 40 years ago and superior to any other 

conventional military force.

It was not until the 1980s, however, as the United States emphasized qualitative 

superiority in the face of unmatchable Soviet quantitative superiority, that the military 

began to realize that the benefits of the different space networks for collection, 

communications, and navigation were greater than the sum of the parts. The work of John 

Boyd, who emphasized the benefits of rapid decisionmaking and information superiority 

for military effectiveness, was influential in shaping the new approach. The elements of 

this new mode of warfare were information superiority, connectivity (among sensors, 

combatants, and commanders), and, ultimately, network-centric organization and 

operations.7 The most important event for understanding this change was the first war 

against Iraq in the Persian Gulf. The outlines of a new mode of warfare emerged after the 

Gulf War. This revolution in military affairs emphasized the greater use and better 

communication of information among commanders, analysts, and combatants.

The Persian Gulf War, in which space-based resources played a central role in shaping 

both strategy and tactics for the first time, was a pivotal moment in the military use of 

satellites. The satellite network designed for use against the Soviet Union in a global war 

gave the United States a measurable advantage against a heavily armed regional 

competitor. Combined with airborne assets, this collection provided significant 

advantages to United States Central Command (USCENTCOM). Iraqi forces found it 

difficult to compete with an opponent well supplied with space services for navigation 

and remote sensing and possessing a superior communications network.

The war demonstrated the benefits for military operations of combining space-based 

communications, navigation, and sensor data. Remote sensing satellites provided data on 

the disposition and strength of Iraqi forces, supplied targeting information, and allowed 

coalition forces to assess battle damage. The specialized Defense Support Program (DSP) 

satellites were able to provide warning (albeit very little) of Iraqi Scud launches. The use 

of military communications satellites and rented transponders on commercial 

communications satellites allowed unparalleled coordination between deployed U.S. 

forces and Washington. Although receivers were in short supply for the campaign, GPS 

satellites allowed coalition forces to navigate with precision in the desert and in the air. 
The combination reduced uncertainty for coalition commanders, allowing faster and more 

precise operations that less well-informed opponents could not match.

The most important aspect of the use of satellites in the Persian Gulf was the direction it 

suggested for future conventional warfare. First, the use of precision-guided weapons, 

combined with GPS and remote sensing data, made possible a new and more lethal 

method of attack. One of the early highlights of the Gulf War was General Charles 

Horner, the air component commander, showing the press a video of a precision-guided 

munition flying through an air vent into an Iraqi government building. The combination 

of air assets and space data required a much smaller number of aircraft, weapons, and 

sorties to destroy a target. Second, and perhaps more important, the integration of satellite 

services for communications and data collection suggested that the United States could 

develop an advantage in information use that would make its forces more effective in 

future conflicts. The integration of satellite services (communications, remote sensing, 

and navigation) with precision-guided munitions and command structures helped lay the 

groundwork for military transformation.

The successes of coordinated efforts in Operation Desert Storm stood in stark contrast to 

the operations in Grenada a decade earlier. Grenada highlighted coordination difficulties 

among air, naval, and ground forces that reduced the combined effectiveness of American 

forces. Mistakes and incompatibilities that the United States could overcome when 

opposed by a few hundred lightly armed Cuban soldiers might have proven fatal in any 

contest with Soviet forces in Central Europe. Grenada only reinforced the importance of 

coordination and coherence for military effectiveness.

The passage and implementation of the Goldwater-Nichols Department of Defense 

Reorganization Act of 1986 (PL 99–433) were crucial developments for military 

spacepower.Goldwater-Nichols made important improvements to the chain of command, 

but for space, its most important effect grew out of the new role of the combatant 

commanders and their new authorities over all branches of the armed Services. 

Goldwater-Nichols created a new set of customers—the combatant commanders—who 

were eager for information and impatient with the complex and slow procedures 

developed since the 1950s for passing information from "national" assets to the 

combatant.

The implications of Goldwater-Nichols for space were also significant. The new law and 

the Pentagon's efforts to implement it created a precedent for space operations. Instead of

Army, Navy, Marine, and Air Force units or systems operating independently and 

reporting to different command authorities, the combatant commander had unified 

authority over all units and systems assigned to him. This unified, combatant-oriented 

approach would seep into the thinking about how to organize and use space assets.

However, Goldwater-Nichols did not extend far into space. A combatant commander 

exercised at best only partial control over the space assets he would use. While some 

assets belonged to DOD, others were controlled by the Intelligence Community. 

Satellites operated by civilian agencies and commercial satellites also fell outside the 
combatant commander's control.This diffusion of control over assets made control over 

information even more important.Immediate and direct access to the information and 

services generated by satellites could compensate for a complicated tasking process.

Timely access did not occur automatically. Grenada and the Gulf War exposed problems 

in the distribution of imagery and other satellite intelligence.8 There were long delays in 

relaying information to the combatant commanders, although these delays became 

progressively shorter during the Gulf War (daily pressure from a vociferous 

USCENTCOM commander helped lead to this progressive shortening). Essentially, there 

was a lag, usually of many hours, in getting data collected by satellites to the combatant 

commander and his staff. In the competition with the Soviets, when the primary targets 

for satellite collection were strategic—fixed missile silos, weapons plants, or airfields—

this lag had not been a problem. In combat operations, however, the lag contributed to the 

troubling uncertainty faced by commanders. The desire of commanders for timely and 

full access to satellite data and services helped to move the focus of military space 

activities from national assets used primarily for strategic purposes to assets providing 

information and services for operational and tactical purposes.

This change in focus for military space helped to drive a larger shift in U.S. intelligence 

priorities in the 1990s. Support for combatant commanders and for the warfighter became 

the central mission of intelligence, particularly as the collapse of the Soviet Union left the 

Intelligence Community without its traditional mission focused on a major state 

opponent. The increased priority placed on intelligence support for the military began 

with Desert Storm and peaked during operations in Kosovo, when a large proportion of 

all U.S. intelligence assets (including national technical means) were used to support U.S. 

forces.

The Gulf War showed the shortcomings of another strategic space system designed for 

the static environment of the Cold War. The DSP satellites used to detect Soviet missile 

launches performed well in detecting Iraqi Scud launches but were inadequate for 

determining the position of the mobile launchers; none were found during the war.The 

DSP launch notification fit well with a strategy of deterrence: the Soviet Union knew that 

the United States would detect any launch almost immediately and could quickly retaliate 

against preselected strategic targets. It did not work so well in the more fluid combat 

environment of the Gulf War.

The Gulf War also exposed a new set of risks for the United States. The availability of 

commercial space services gave smaller opponents the opportunity to mimic the space 

capabilities of the larger powers without the expense of building and launching a large 

satellite fleet. During the war, the combatant commander had to consider the possibility 

that the Iraqis would acquire commercial imagery from a French service provider or from 

the Soviets. This imagery might have allowed the Iraqis to divine his intention to swing 

the bulk of his forces in a hook to the west. In the case of France, the provision of such 

imagery was blocked, but the potential of Soviet imagery being provided to the Iraqis 

remained a nagging concern.
This concern has only increased as commercial space services in imagery and 

communication have become widespread. Commercial space assets fall under a different 

legal regime than national assets, and by the end of the 1990s, the United States faced 

(and continues to face) the potential problem of how to gain space control in a conflict 

where an opponent uses space services provided by a neutral third party. As with the 

Soviets during the Gulf War, cooperation cannot always be assumed. Blocking the 

service or attacking the satellite that delivers it puts the United States in the awkward 

position of widening its campaign. The growth in the availability of commercial space 

services since 1990 means that space is no longer a unique source of U.S. advantage.

That said, the United States still gains more from space than its potential opponents, not 

only because of the size of its space fleet, but also because of the effort it has made to 

incorporate space services into doctrine and planning. The best example of the effect of 

space technologies on military operations is GPS, which in some ways helps make the 

dreams of the airpower theorists a reality—instead of dozens of aircraft flying hundreds 

of sorties to destroy a target, a single aircraft and its weapons, guided by satellite data, 

could be sufficient.

More importantly, and in contrast to national-level space systems, GPS provides its data 

directly and immediately to the combatant. The alternative, during the Gulf War and 

earlier, was for satellite data to stream to a facility in the United States, undergo analysis, 

and then make its way to the combatant. If GPS operated like other satellite services, a 

tank commander or platoon leader would put in a request for positional data. The request 

would be queued. Once acted upon, Washington would process and relay the GPS data to 

the combatant command headquarters. It would then work its way back to the combatant, 

who would know his position only a day or two after asking for it. This is how spacebased imagery and signals intelligence are supplied. By providing an alternate experience 

of immediate access to data, from space, GPS suggested an intuitive model for thinking 

about how to integrate space into air and ground operations: useable data should flow 

from satellites directly to the combatant.

Naval operations already had incorporated space into combat planning, albeit in a less 

direct form. Just as GPS allowed a ship to determine its position accurately, signals 

intelligence and radar imagery from satellites provided the ability to locate and target 

enemy ships or task forces. This targeting was an outgrowth of the use of signals 

intelligence in the World Wars (the British and Germans began to use radio intercepts in 

the First World War to locate opposing warships). The lesson for air, ground, and naval 

operations is that spacepower may mean getting precise information to combatants more 

rapidly than an opponent provides military advantage.

The insights about informational advantage helped to drive much of the thinking about 

the future of conflict in the 1990s, and this new thinking was in turn an incentive for 

spacepower theory. The storyline is that the United States assembled fleets of satellites 

for strategic purposes and then found that they could be applied for operational 

advantage. The revolution in military affairs that grew out of the Gulf War showed that 

there had been a change in the nature of warfare brought about by the use of new 
technologies, in particular space technologies. This led to changes in doctrine and 

organization that fundamentally alter the character and conduct of military operations.

It is no exaggeration to say that the revolution would not have been possible without 

satellites. Satellite communications provided new levels of coordination and the ability to 

transfer massive (for the time) amounts of information rapidly to commanders. Imagery 

and signals intelligence provided an unparalleled amount of knowledge about terrain, 

enemy forces, and the effect of U.S. strikes. GPS enabled precision navigation (and in 

later conflicts, precision-guided weapons) and helped to remove a chief cause of 

uncertainty from combat: the uncertainty of the location of one's own forces. Before GPS, 

the bulk of radio traffic in most battles revolved around the question, "Where are you?"

Uncertainty is the opposite of information superiority. Space assets provided tools and 

data that reduce uncertainty and allow strategists to operationalize John Boyd's ideas on 

how to use the decisionmaking cycle to attain superiority in combat. Space assets, in 

combination with new information technologies, were also an essential underpinning for 

jointness. Better communications, better locational data, and better intelligence increased 

the ability of the combatant commanders established by Goldwater-Nichols to meld the 

contributions of the disparate Services into a much more unified force than had been 

possible in previous conflicts.

The Pursuit of Coherence 

Although the Gulf War showed that the United States had the most powerful 

conventional military in the world, the 1990s were a period of strategic confusion. The 

grand strategy that had guided national security since 1947 was no longer needed, but it 

was unclear what, if anything, should take its place, and both Republican and Democratic 

administrations undertook major efforts in the 1990s to define the new threats to U.S. 

security and formulate the appropriate response. 

The effect of this strategic confusion on space programs was mixed. The United States 

had over 100 military or defense-related satellites in operation—roughly twice as many 

as all the military satellites operated by all other nations put together. These satellites 

provided communications, navigation, weather prediction, and intelligence and 

surveillance capabilities.Some programs, such as those that monitored the globe for 

nuclear detonations or for missile launches, remained important as nonproliferation 

became a new focus for strategy. Other programs seemed less relevant or were 

challenged by technological changes in communications, which damaged the ability to 

collect from space. The result was a deemphasis on spending for new space systems. The 

1990s were, in many ways, a period of transition in military thinking but of stasis in 

space acquisitions. 

The satellite network designed for use against the Soviet Union in a global war had given 

the United States a measurable advantage in a conflict against a heavily armed regional 

competitor, but the security problems these satellite networks were designed to address 

mapped imperfectly to the Nation's security problems once the Cold War was over. Both 
requirements and targets had changed. In both past and current configurations, the United 

States needed to sustain a global presence, but the rationale for that presence has changed 

significantly.

Telecommunications provides an example of a crucial change in commercial 

technologies that affected an important part of the national technical collection system. 

The adoption of fiber optic cable as the backbone of telecommunications networks in the 

1990s ended the ability to collect telecom signals from space. Fiber optics carry the bulk 

of traffic and use pulses of light to transmit data. Satellites cannot collect against these 

networks. Radio transmissions could still be collected from space, but over the course of 

the decade, a very expensive U.S. investment lost some of its value.

The ad hoc space architecture that emerged during the Cold War depended on a small 

number of large systems. This architecture is more vulnerable than an alternative that 

depended on a larger number of smaller (and less expensive) systems, particularly if the 

use of the smaller satellites did not entail a degradation of capability. At the start of the 

military space competition between the United States and the Soviets, both sides 

developed antisatellite weapons, particularly after the Soviets threatened to deliver 

nuclear weapons from orbiting platforms. Despite these programs, there was an 

understanding that neither side would interfere with the other's satellites, an 

understanding made possible in the context of the larger strategic contest by the need for 

transparency to increase superpower stability.

This rationale no longer holds. During the Cold War, a peer competitor facing a strategic 

nuclear exchange would want to avoid misunderstanding. New competitors do not face 

the same constraints. Additionally, the Persian Gulf War demonstrated the value of space 

assets for U.S. military performance and the dependence of the Nation on its satellite 

fleet. Relatively cheap attacks against U.S. satellites could have a much greater payoff in 

reducing U.S. military effectiveness, particularly if the opponent did not have its own 

fleet and did not rely on space for its military capabilities—the lack of strategic parity 

meant that there was no mutual exchange of hostages in space.

In the 1990s, the only potential opponent who could consider an antisatellite effort was 

China. The Russians had the capabilities, but relations with the United States at that time 

made it unlikely that their programs would be a threat. China, on the other hand, began to 

explore the idea of attacks on U.S. space systems as early as the mid-1990s. There was a 

period of debate over whether China truly had antisatellite programs and whether these 

systems needed to be taken seriously—a debate largely ended by the unannounced 

Chinese satellite test of 2007—but even before this debate concluded, the United States 

realized that its space assets were targets. Space has never been a sanctuary—the first 

programs for antisatellite weapons appeared in 1959—but in the bipolar strategic 

environment, it had been remarkably safe. This safety has now disappeared.

One of the key developments of the 1990s was the emergence of post–Cold War 

competition in space. The competition, unlike the contest with the Soviets, was 

asymmetric; no one tried to match the United States satellite for satellite. However, many 
nations had seen the advantages space conferred on the United States in the Gulf War and 

have considered how to interfere with it; a handful tried to gain similar benefits from 

different (and smaller) space architectures.9 One crucial difference was that these nations 

did not need to depend on dedicated military platforms. The emergence of a commercial 

space market in communications and remote imaging allowed nations to augment their 

military capabilities by buying commercial services. Commercial remote sensing and 

interpretive software provide a low-budget image intelligence capability accessible to 

most nations. These commercial systems do not yet provide a level of service equal to 

U.S. national technical means, but they offer non-spacefaring nations an immense 

expansion of capability for some military or intelligence tasks.

The 1990s also saw an accelerated integration of commercial space services into military 

operations. One reason for this was the decline in defense spending after the end of the 

Cold War. The United States could no longer sustain the satellite industrial base created 

during the Cold War at the lower levels of defense spending. This meant that some 

satellite manufacturers looked to take the skills and technologies they had developed for 

the military and commercialize them. It also meant that the military and intelligence 

communities would not be receiving the same flow of satellites into their inventories; this 

either encouraged or forced them to buy from commercial service providers.

Early debates in Congress and the executive branch in the 1960s led to the establishment 

of an independent military satellite communications system. This independent capability 

would meet national security needs, while the emerging commercial communications 

satellite industry would provide less sensitive services. In the mid-1970s, Congress 

directed DOD to increase its use of leased commercial satellite services, providing a 

precedent for thinking in the 1990s about commercial remote sensing.

In remote sensing, NRO encouraged some of its suppliers to undertake commercial 

operations. The cornerstone of the new approach, with its blending of commercial and 

national security activities, was the 1994 Presidential Decision Directive 23 (PDD 23). 

This directive was an effort by the Intelligence Community, the Defense Department, and 

the Department of State in 1991 to come to grips with the effect of the Persian Gulf War 

on demand for remote sensing and the end of Cold War expenditures for government 

satellite systems. The Gulf War excited foreign demand for space remote sensing 

capabilities at the same time that U.S. Government demand for remote sensing satellites 

was declining drastically. Congressional pressure to manage imagery requirements better 

and to support industry also shaped PDD 23 (the Land Remote Sensing Policy Act of 

1992, for example, supported the development of private systems and authorized the 

Commerce Department to license private sector parties to operate private remote sensing 

space systems). 

PDD 23 also provided a brief link between nonproliferation and national security space. 

One goal of the policy was to discourage other nations from "proliferating" dangerous 

remote sensing capabilities. The first Clinton administration attempted to develop a 

multilateral regime to control remote sensing capabilities along the lines of the Missile 

Technology Control Regime.Unsurprisingly, this effort was a failure; no nation was 
willing to deny itself the potential for access to space remote sensing. The 1990s were 

thus also the decade when the United States would have to consider in its military 

planning the effect of ubiquitous commercial space services available to all of its 

potential opponents.

PDD 23, reinforced by the 1996 National Space Policy (PDD 49), did have greater 

success, after a rough start, in encouraging the launch of U.S. commercial remote sensing 

service providers.While satellites operated by NRO were more capable than those of the 

commercial service providers, they were not omnipresent, and the services provided by 

commercial operators could provide expanded coverage, fill crucial gaps in collection, 

and be more easily shared with allies.

Several factors shaped security space efforts in the 1990s. The first was the 

reconceptualization of military operations that began after the Persian Gulf War. In 

connection with the experience of the Gulf War, the explosive growth of information 

technologies and networks provided new capabilities for the information provided by 

space assets and a net-centric way of thinking about how to organize and use those 

assets.The decline of the defense market and the diffusion of advanced technology into 

the commercial sector led to the creation of a robust commercial space presence that 

created, in communications and (at the end of the decade) in remote sensing, both 

opportunities and challenges for national security. Finally, reorienting the massive 

technical collection systems away from a single, static superpower opponent to a new 

range of problems involving smaller, informal targets initially created serious problems 

for intelligence operations in space. The reorganization of U.S. imagery analytical 

capabilities into the National Imagery and Mapping Agency (a merger of CIA and DOD 

assets) and the development of close relations between NGA and NSA helped to 

overcome this problem by taking advantage of the new tools for analysis and blending 

imagery with data from other national technical collection means. This combination of 

commercial and government data increased the value of imagery for military purposes. 

In communications, DOD would have been happier if it had its own communications 

satellites. However, the rapidly growing demand for data and communications 

engendered by the new style of warfare that began in the Persian Gulf, combined with 

smaller budgets, meant that DOD had no choice but to turn to commercial providers. 

Operations in Kosovo are reputed to have required 4 times as much communications 

capability as the first Persian Gulf War, and the Iraq war is reputed to require 10 times as 

much bandwidth. The combatant command's demand for data put immense strains on 

military communications and expanded the use of commercial communications satellites 

to support DOD.DOD purchases of satellite communications services were of 

considerable benefit to operators of commercial communications satellites and, in turn, 

gave DOD the data and communications capabilities it needed and also some flexibility 

in contracting for global communications services.

Another aspect of the new competition and the widespread awareness of U.S. capabilities 

in space was the routine adoption of countermeasures by a range of opponents. Adversary 

awareness was not new; the Soviets knew from the first that U.S. satellites were spying 
on them.The Internet provided even poor and unsophisticated opponents knowledge of 

when U.S. satellites would be overhead, since enthusiast Web sites provide tracking data 

for most satellites.Potential U.S. opponents informally shared information on 

countermeasures. The open discussion in the United States of satellite assets and, at 

times, of the classified results garnered by those assets encouraged these 

countermeasures. During Operation Allied Force in 1999, the Serbs successfully used a 

mixture of concealment, mobility, and deception to confound U.S. technical collection. 

Their success has encouraged others to explore ways to counter U.S. informational 

advantages. Jamming, spoofing, and kinetic attack will be part of any future conflict.

The Gulf War showed that more timely, precise satellite data are the key to greater 

effectiveness. This revelation led to requirements and plans in the 1990s to acquire more 

capable military communications satellites and new kinds of sensors, including a 

replacement for the venerable Defense Support Program satellites. However, in the 

absence of the incentives for spending and innovation provided by having a competitor, 

U.S. space programs entered a period of decline in the 1990s. 

In part, this is explained by the decline in the U.S. investment in national security space. 

Spending on DOD space programs declined significantly, and while figures for 

intelligence programs remain classified, we can assume they followed a similar trend. If 

the 1990s was the decade when strategists, learning from the first space war in the 

Persian Gulf, began to reshape doctrine and tactics to give space a central role in military 

power, budget figures did not reflect this. The bulk of military space spending increases 

occurred in the 1960s and again in the 1980s, with the high point occurring in 1988 (see 

figure 14–1).10 Spending fell drastically at the end of the Cold War, bottomed in 1995, 

and then remained flat until the end of the century. Overall, the United States spent 12 

percent less on space in the 1990s than it did in the 1980s. This produced a $20 billion 

shortfall that, when combined with changes in the acquisitions process, slowed the 

increase in U.S. military space capabilities.11

Figure 14–1. DOD Space Budget, 1960–1999
Changes in acquisitions regulations to tighten control over program costs slowed the 

ability to introduce new systems. Additionally, changes in how NRO acquired satellites, 

"rigid requirements" negotiated among many agencies for new systems, and an increase 

in congressional oversight (since the 1980s, programs had been vetted by Intelligence 

Committee staffs) slowed innovation. This situation could be described as the triumph of 

accountants over engineers.Defenders of greater oversight for space acquisitions could 

say that the United States tried to do too much too fast in space in the 1990s; that its 

programs came too close to the edge of technical feasibility; and that there had not been 

enough consideration of the kinds of platforms needed or the alternatives to expensive 

space investments. Yet acceptance of risk, and of failure, is a crucial part of innovation. 

Could the United States ever again have a Corona program, with its 13 consecutive 

failures?12

Conclusion 

The starting point for this history is a 1945 Army Air Force Report to the Secretary of 

War. The end point is the 2000 Report of the Commission to Assess United States 

National Security Space Management and Organization. Although separated by 55 years, 

both reports reached the same conclusion: that U.S. national security depended on a 

robust presence in space.Security operations in space, however, are not the same as 

spacepower.

Current discussions of spacepower come at a difficult moment for American strategic 

thinking. The United States is in a complex transition to adjust its policies, forces, and 
strategies to fit a new international security environment. This environment is not one of 

unalloyed peace that many had hoped for at the end of the Cold War, but a dangerous 

environment of uncooperative allies and asymmetric threats. Disappointment with the 

conflict in Iraq and disenchantment with muscular foreign policies have helped to 

reenergize interest in what some call soft power, which uses the tools of persuasion to 

advance national interests. Space programs are an element of soft power; they provide 

prestige and technological prowess that can be turned into influence and leadership on the 

international stage. When NASA manages to launch a shuttle, the world is reminded of 

America's technological prowess.

Soft power has serious limitations. It is inadequate to constrain a hostile and determined 

opponent. Realists might say that soft power can only be effective when it is backed by 

more traditional elements of power: a coherent strategy, a robust economy, a strong 

military, and efficient diplomatic and intelligence services—in other words, hard power. 

Spacepower is also a component of hard power. The information and services provided 

from space are a force multiplier, making for better informed strategies and more 

effective combatants.

In many other ways, space's unique contribution to U.S. national power is decreasing.The 

U.S. comparative advantage is shrinking. Commercial satellite services are readily 

available to anyone, anywhere, with a little money. The Mumbai terrorists used GPS and 

commercial imagery to plan their attacks, for example.The diffusion of technologies 

gives many nations an ability to build and operate satellites. More than 80 nations plan to 

acquire or build remote sensing satellites. Miniaturization of microelectronics, sensors, 

and satellites provides low-cost alternatives to U.S. behemoths. The sense that the United 

States spends more but gets less in civil space undercuts the history of achievements in 

the 1970s. Only in one area—the integrated use of national security space—does the 

Nation retain a comparative advantage so great that it can be termed asymmetric, an 

unequal lead against any potential opponent.

The basis of this predominance is the more than 100 U.S. satellites in orbit for remote 

collection of images and signals, communications, and navigation. The presence in space 

is matched by an extensive and experienced ground component to process, analyze, and 

disseminate information from space assets. It is reinforced by the U.S. lead in 

conceptualizing how best to use space assets and services for military advantage. The 

Cold War constellation of satellites proved invaluable in the recent wars with Iraq and the 

Taliban, and the U.S. lead in national security space is a core element for deterring 

potential opponents from challenging the United States in a conventional military 

conflict. Satellite services and the use of space are a critical component of U.S. national 

security.

The current U.S. military space system, while superior to any in the world, faces new 

demands and new missions for which it was not designed. For much of the preceding five 

decades, the space mission was targeted toward a single opponent whose threat came 

from large military and strategic forces. The current space mission is different; the Nation 

faces a range of opponents who are more diffuse, have lower profiles, and use different 
technologies. The requirement for timely, continuous information on these new 

opponents puts increasing stress on the national security space system. Problems of cost, 

technological limitations, and disorganization, which have been present since the 1950s, 

increase this tension. 

Changes in the military use of space also challenge the assets and architectures built up 

over 50 years. Military planning, operations, and tactics have been transformed by the use 

of information, sensors, space assets, and information technologies. Future missions will 

place intensive requirements on space-based sensors and other sensor platforms to 

provide persistent, real-time surveillance, intelligence, and reconnaissance over areas of 

interest regardless of weather conditions. Providing information superiority at the tactical 

level may require accelerating flows of information from sensor to weapon to provide for 

"instantaneous attack" over widely dispersed and separate areas. Afghanistan and Iraq 

show the potential benefits to be gained from the tactical exploitation of national space 

capabilities, but they also show the need to accelerate the use of new technologies and 

architectures and speed integration of information and systems into military operations.

The differences between hard and soft power are suggestive for the concept of 

spacepower and for reviewing military and intelligence activities in space. Spacepower 

remains an ambiguous concept. This ambiguity, as yet unresolved, has complicated and 

shaped efforts since the 1950s to develop strategic concepts for military and intelligence 

operations in space.Space forces, as they are now, cannot destroy an opposing force, nor 

are they the instrument of victory in battle. If we agree with Clausewitz that "fighting is 

the central military act," can spacepower be anything but soft power and a support 

function for national security if it does not provide for the direct application of force? The 

history of military and intelligence activities in space, although well known and easily 

summarized, does not provide a clear answer to this question.

Notes

1. The 1982 National Security Decision Directive 42 on National Space Policy designated the shuttle 

as the primary launch vehicle for national security payloads and instructed the Department of 

Defense to discontinue the use of expendable launch vehicles once the shuttle could meet all of its 

needs.

2. Report of the Commission to Assess United States National Security Space Management and 

Organization, January 2001, 10.

3. "Call for Test Pilots," Time, April 13, 1959, available at 

<www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,810946,00.html>.

4. Directive 5160.32, "Development of Space Systems," March 28, 1961. The directive gave the Air 

Force authority for development, acquisition, and launch of military space systems.

5. Letter, Richard M. Bissell, Jr., to Allen Dulles, August 8, 1961, available at 

<www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/NSAEBB/NSAEBB54/st13.pdf>.

6. See <www.eisenhower.archives.gov/dl/NASA/Binder19.pdf>.

7. See chapter 10, "The Revolution in Military Affairs and Joint Vision 2010," in the Annual Report 

to the President and Congress, Department of Defense, 1999 at 

<www.defenselink.mil/execsec/adr1999/>. There is an extensive literature discussing Boyd's 
theories, which appeared in his "Discourse on Winning and Losing," an unpublished set of lectures 

delivered at the U.S. Air Force Air University. A partial bibliography of works on Boyd can be 

found at <www.au.af.mil/au/aul/school/ots/boyd.htm>.

8. Admiral Wesley McDonald, CINCLANT for the Grenada operation, said afterward: "We have 

designed and are continuing to design systems which collect intelligence in great volume and in 

near real time, but I am concerned as to whether we are designing into these systems the 

communications capability to get that data to the tactical commander in a useable fashion and 

timely manner. . . . What good is sophisticated satellite imagery sitting in Washington, DC, or 

Norfolk, Virginia, when the field commander who needs it is on the ground in Grenada, on a 

ship?" Quoted in Stephen E. Anno and William E. Einspahr, "Command and Control and 

Communications Lessons Learned: Iranian Rescue, Falklands Conflict, Grenada Invasion, Libya 

Raid," Air War College Research Report, Number AU–AWC–88–043, 36–63.

9. Commission to Assess the Ballistic Missile Threat to the United States, 1998:

A number of nations are incorporating technical features of the RMA [revolution in military 

affairs] into their forces. These include space-based surveillance, reconnaissance and 

communications by way of both space and land-based fiber-optic networks (perhaps using civilian 

assets), guidance from the space-based global positioning system/global navigation satellite 

system (GPS/GLONASS) to increase the accuracy of missiles and the computational capabilities 

needed to plan, organize, and conduct operations.

10. Spending as a percentage of gross domestic product correlates closely with the dollar figures.

11. NASA, "Aeronautics and Space Report of the President, Fiscal Year 2004 Activities," appendix 

D–1B, "Space Activities of the U.S. Government," 120.

12. The National Commission for the Review of the National Reconnaissance Office, 2000; Dennis 

Fitzgerald, "Commentary on 'The Decline of the National Reconnaissance Office': NRO 

Leadership Replies," Studies in Intelligence 46, no. 2, available at 

<https://www.cia.gov/library/center-for-the-study-of-intelligence/csi-publications/csistudies/studies/vol46no2/article12.html>. 
Chapter 15:

Theory Ascendant? 

Spacepower and the Challenge of Strategic Theory

John B. Sheldon and Colin S. Gray

Some time ago, one of us asked, "Where is the theory of spacepower? Where is the 

Mahan for the final frontier?"1 Over 10 years later, such an exhortation still has resonance 

as the realm of spacepower still lacks a "space focused strategic theory" and a "binding 

concept" that can "aid understanding of what it is all about."2 This chapter seeks to 

provide an explanation, or at least plausible reasons, as to why such a theory of spacepower has yet to transpire. First, we shall discuss the difficulties involved in creating a 

theory of spacepower that is able to endure the test of time and that has universal 

applicability. The chapter then examines recent attempts at theorizing on spacepower by 

James Oberg, Everett Dolman, and John Klein. Lastly, the chapter outlines what a theory 

of spacepower should look like, and just as importantly, what it should not look like, as a 

guide for future theorists. 

It should be noted that an exhortation of an "Alfred Thayer Mahan for the final frontier" 

is not to be confused with an endorsement of a Mahanian style of theory. Such a style of 

strategic theory may yet suffice (for the present, at least) for the purposes of guidance for 

spacepower, but we do encourage all plausible methods of elucidating a theory of spacepower, be it directly influenced by the thought and style of either Mahan or of any other 

strategic theorist. Instead, the call for a Mahan for space-power is in fact a call for a 

theory that can match the stature of Mahan's collected thoughts on seapower. 

This chapter uses the word strategy in an unashamedly Clausewitzian sense, and for 

clarity of meaning we offer up a definition of strategy as well as spacepower. Strategy is 

defined here as the use that is made of force and the threat of force for the ends of policy. 3 This definition is preferred because it takes into account the instrumental character of 

strategy that uses a variety of means as well as its ubiquitous applicability in both peace 

and war. This definition is distinctly military in scope, but we do not dismiss the notion 

of spacepower serving diplomatic, economic, and cultural aspects of a state's wider grand 

strategy. B.H. Liddell Hart defined grand strategy as the process and ability "to coordinate and direct all the resources of a nation, or band of nations, towards the 

attainment of the political object of the war."4 Most satellite systems are dual-use; 

military systems such as the U.S. global positioning system (GPS) navigation satellites 

have myriad civil and commercial applications, and commercial systems, such as highresolution imaging satellites, have myriad military applications. Spacepower is defined 

here as "the ability in peace, crisis, and war to exert prompt and sustained influence in or 

from space."5 This influence can be exerted by commercial, civil, or military satellites as 

appropriate, though it should be noted that a theory of spacepower should have little to 

say about the purely commercial and civil exploitation of space, just as air- and seapower 
theories have little to say about the purely commercial and civil exploitation of the sea 

and air. A theory of spacepower should not try to overreach its mandate and be all things 

to all agendas. Instead, a theory of spacepower is about the ability to exert prompt and 

sustained influence in or from space for the purposes and furtherance of policy in peace 

and war. 

Impediments to a Theory of Spacepower 

Why spacepower theory has yet to produce a notable theorist is the subject of speculation 

on numerous plausible and seemingly implausible factors. There is much to impede the 

creation and development of a sound theory for spacepower. Some of these impediments 

are unintentional and random incidents, phenomena and events that are the stuff of 

everyday defense planning and strategic decisionmaking. Other impediments are more 

insidious, the product of institutional prejudices and failings, or flaws in military and 

strategic culture. Spacepower theorists must try to remove themselves from these day-today impediments and institutional and cultural prejudices and failings in order to produce 

theory that is enduring and universally applicable. 

Among the many impediments to the creation and development of spacepower theory, 

the following seem most pertinent for the purposes of our discussion. 

Limited Spacepower History 

At present, spacepower cannot draw upon any informative historical experience that can 

provide valuable lessons, as compared to the experience of land, air-, or seapower. Even 

the nuclear realm can draw upon historical experience, albeit a mercifully brief and 

limited one. Some might plausibly argue that spacepower has plenty of historical 

experience to draw upon from the Cold War and from military operations since Operation 

Desert Storm in 1991. The problem with the Cold War is that it was a unique moment in 

the history of international politics. Spacepower is a child of the Cold War but has also 

survived its erstwhile parent, which imposed a unique political context that dictated how 

spacepower was used. As the international system shifts from a unipolar to an eventual 

multipolar complexion, the political context in which spacepower operates shall also 

change and will likely resemble, in broad terms, previous multipolar experiences. This is 

not to say that the Cold War holds no lessons whatsoever for spacepower, but it does 

mean that it cannot be our sole data point. 

Similarly, the exploitation of spacepower in the several wars of choice since the end of 

the Cold War from Desert Storm through to the present war on terror can be illustrative 

only to the extent that the largely unchallenged use of spacepower ever can be. In its 

numerous wars of choice since the early 1990s, the United States and its allies have 

become increasingly reliant upon spacepower for the threat and application of military 

force, yet real and potential adversaries have been relatively slow to counteract the 

strategic leverage derived from U.S. spacepower. This initially tardy response from those 

who have the most to fear from overwhelming U.S. military dominance, derived in large 

part from spacepower, is beginning to take greater urgency as more polities exploit space 
for their own security objectives as well as develop and obtain their own counterspace 

capabilities.6 

Of course, it might be argued that adversaries of the United States and its allies have 

countered the overwhelming advantages that are derived from spacepower by fighting in 

a manner that renders space-derived combat power irrelevant, such as terrorism and other 

asymmetric tactics. This argument is plausible to a point but is rendered moot when one 

discovers that even these adversaries are the beneficiaries of spacepower in their own 

unique ways. For example, al Qaeda is known to have used satellite telephones for 

tactical command and control, and Hizballah uses its own satellite television station, AlManar TV, to disseminate its virulent propaganda. These examples aside, as the offensedefense competition of fielded space capability versus counterspace capability is liable to 

continue, so the theorist is likely to glean meaningful lessons as the U.S. and allied 

reliance upon spacepower is increasingly challenged. 

Among the calls for a theory of spacepower, it is often forgotten that the use and practice 

of spacepower is quite young in comparison to land, air-, and seapower. Land power has 

been in existence for thousands of years and yet it was not until the 16th century that a 

concerted effort at theorymaking truly began,7 and it was not until the 19th century that we 

saw the greatest exponents of land power, and strategic theory in general, in Jomini and 

Clausewitz.8 The naval and maritime theories of Mahan, Julian Corbett, Raoul Castex, 

and Charles Edward Callwell only appeared after sea and maritime power had been 

practiced for several thousand years.9 It is only with the arrival of airpower in the early 

20th century that we have seen attempts to theorize about its exploitation in parallel with 

its continuing evolution. It cannot be denied, however, that airpower theory is the subject 

of considerable debate and even controversy. For some, the body of work created by the 

likes of Giulio Douhet, William Mitchell, J.C. Slessor, and John Warden10 is far from 

conclusive, and in many cases should perhaps be regarded more as vision than as theory. 

As David MacIsaac points out, "Air power . . . has nonetheless yet to find a clearly 

defined or unchallenged place in the history of military or strategic theory. There has 

been no lack of theorists, but they have had only limited influence in a field where the 

effects of technology and the deeds of practitioners have from the beginning played 

greater roles than have ideas."11 Harold R. Winton is even more explicit on this point 

when he writes that "there simply does not exist any body of codified, systematic thought 

that can purport to be called a comprehensive theory of air power."12 Winton goes on to 

assert that one of the reasons why this is so is because airpower has a very thin historical 

base upon which to draw for the purposes of creating a comprehensive and universal 

theory.13 

Attempts to craft a plausible theory of spacepower at this early juncture in spacepower 

history are indeed unique in the history of military thought, especially if the aim is (as it 

indeed should be) to develop a theory that avoids the worst excesses of airpower theory. 

We are far from convinced that it is too early in the history of spacepower to begin 

crafting a theory that can guide its action and relate it to all other forms of military and 

national power, but such a possibility cannot be entirely discounted. 
Confusion over Definitions 

This chapter is emphatic in what it means by spacepower, strategy, and a theory of 

spacepower. Unfortunately, many misunderstand, misconstrue, or are ignorant of such 

terms. Much of this confusion is innocent enough in intent but has and continues to cause 

much damage to the quest for a theory of spacepower. For example, at a symposium 

associated with the project resulting in this book, several delegates seemed to think that a 

theory of spacepower was essentially a theory for the unilateral domination of space by 

the United States. Such an interpretation is mistaken, though it should be noted that a 

plausible theory of spacepower should be able to lend itself to imperialist space ambitions 

as well as efforts to create a multilateral regime in space. For what purposes spacepower 

is used is entirely up to the policymakers of the day. All that a theory of spacepower 

should do is assist the policymaker in achieving those purposes, regardless of what they 

are. Nor is spacepower alone in this matter. Airpower too has had problems in pinning 

down a consensus on key and fundamental definitions.14 

The exploitation and capabilities of spacepower in the United States and other states are, 

and have been, highly classified, thus preventing many would-be theorists from accessing 

any lessons learned from previous applications of spacepower and publicly promulgating 

any theory based on such access. There are many good reasons to keep certain aspects of 

spacepower classified, especially as it relates to intelligence gathering and the technical 

details of satellite capabilities, yet there is also a culture of secrecy that has evolved over 

the decades that has kept not only adversaries, but for a long while much of the U.S. 

military and government, in the dark about U.S. space capability. The classification of 

spacepower is not a uniquely American phenomenon, as the space powers of Russia, 

China, Israel, and several European countries attest, but the dissemination of space 

capabilities to developing countries may see, from a theorist's perspective, greater 

transparency in how spacepower is used as space increasingly becomes an arena for 

greater and more intense competition. 

Tales of Derring-do 

Over the decades, civil space programs, such as the first Soviet and U.S. manned space 

missions, the Apollo moon landings, and the International Space Station, have helped 

divert public and media attention away from military and intelligence space programs. In 

the United States, a high-profile civil space program, in the form of the National 

Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA), was set up deliberately to distract 

attention from the overhead reconnaissance satellite capability as well as other military 

space programs in order to lend credence to the principle of peaceful uses of outer space 

in the longstanding U.S. national space policy. This is not to argue that the U.S. civil 

space program does not have any intrinsic value beyond that of providing useful political 

cover for more sensitive programs, but rather to point out that the focus on the scientific 

and civil aspects of spacepower has done little to encourage the development of a theory 

of spacepower. 

Portrayal of Space in Popular Culture 
The influence of popular science fiction programs and films, such as Star Trek and Star 

Wars, has helped generate a public perception and expectation of space that are far 

removed from reality. Among the media, science fiction has had a deleterious effect, 

creating a view of it as a place of grandiose yet broken dreams, little green men, and alien 

abductions. As a result, space, and therefore spacepower, is not taken as seriously as it 

should be. 

Complexity 

A theory of spacepower has to explain and translate action in space into strategic effect 

on Earth, and vice versa. It must take into account not only spacepower itself, but also the 

effect and influence of land, air-, and seapower, nuclear and information operations, as 

well as special operations upon each other and upon spacepower. A theory of spacepower 

also has to consider the roles and influence of science, technology, politics, law, 

diplomacy, society, and economics, among others. It is a daunting subject.15 

Policy Distractions 

Debates on nuclear deterrence and stability theory, ballistic missile defense, revolutions 

in military affairs, and, more recently, global insurgencies have all impeded the quest for 

a theory of spacepower. Elements of information-enabled warfare, such as precision 

strike and persistent battlespace surveillance, are all, to varying degrees, enabled by space 

systems. At present, spacepower is often thought about in these terms, yet there is a 

danger that a theory for spacepower is conflated with information-led warfare when, in 

fact, spacepower has the potential to be much more than an enabler. Space systems play a 

vital role in maintaining nuclear postures, any proposed missile defense system, and 

information-enabled operations. More recently, spacepower has been playing a critical 

but quiet role in the war on terror. Yet spacepower is not just the maintenance of nuclear 

postures, missile defense, precision strike, or supporting counterinsurgencies; it is all of 

these things and more.16 

Perils of Linear Thinking 

To say that spacepower is dependent on science, engineering, and technology risks 

insulting even the most theoretically challenged person. However, such a dependency 

may encourage spacepower practitioners and commanders to think of spacepower in a 

mechanistic and linear fashion. A theory of spacepower, or at least one worthy of the 

name, should respect the nonlinear, interactive, and paradoxical nature of strategy and its 

dimensions, which defy mechanistic analysis or mathematical equation.17 

Technological Determinism 

Similarly, because spacepower is so obviously dependent upon technology for strategic 

performance, there is a danger that theory is either blinded or sidelined by a culture that is 

technocentric. A theory of space-power simply cannot afford to ignore the role of 
technology, but it would not be a theory at all if this were the sole focus at the expense of 

the other dimensions of strategy.18 

Understanding Orbitology 

On a related issue, perhaps because spacepower is so dependent on science, engineering, 

and technology, strategic theorists (who normally have an educational background in the 

social sciences or history) have tended to avoid it. Any individual attempting to 

contribute to a theory of spacepower must have, at the very least, a working knowledge 

of orbitology and other principles of spaceflight. 

Out of Sight, Out of Mind 

Lastly, in many ways spacepower is discrete (even allowing for classification issues) and 

does not attract much attention in the way that armies, navies, and air forces do. Apart 

from the awesome sights and sounds of a space launch, one does not see spacepower. 

One does, however, feel spacepower, as its presence in the battlespace is ubiquitous. 

Indeed, spacepower can be likened to intelligence operations: one only hears of it when 

something goes wrong. 

Small Steps: Building on Previous Spacepower Theory 

Despite the importance the Department of Defense attaches to a theory of spacepower, 

there have been surprisingly few works on the subject within the body of spacepower 

literature that exists. The reasons for this may be ascribed to some of the impediments 

listed above, but perhaps the biggest reason is that developing and creating strategic 

theory, much like its practice, are very difficult to do. As Clausewitz pointed out, 

"Everything in war is very simple, but the simplest thing is difficult."19 David Lonsdale is 

even more blunt: "Strategy is difficult; very difficult."20 Discerning enduring and 

universal theory from scant (and often contradictory where it exists) evidence is "very 

difficult," despite the fact that many will not argue with the relatively simple proposition 

that a theory of spacepower is needed. Yet a number of thinkers have risen to the 

challenge in recent years and have attempted to fill the theoretical void. Among these are 

James Oberg (Space Power Theory), Everett Dolman (Astropolitik), and John Klein 

(Space Warfare).21 Each deserves credit for placing himself above the parapet, and each 

in his own way has made unique contributions to the nascent body of theory. Can any of 

these authors lay claim to the mantle of being the Mahan of the space age? Alas, the 

answer must be a reluctant "no." Each has furthered our understanding of spacepower 

considerably, but none has offered a comprehensive theory of spacepower. 

James Oberg 

Oberg provides us with a comprehensive account of spacepower's role in everyday 

activities on Earth22 but falls short in his effort to outline its nature, though his distillation 

of spacepower into Mahanian elements is a useful starting point for any analysis.23 

Oberg's writing is excellent for a description, in laymen's terms, of the physical workings 
and constraints of spacepower.24 Oberg is also to be thanked for many of his axioms—or 

"Truths and Beliefs"25—that attempt to distill something enduring about spacepower. 

These axioms include the following: 

• "The primary attribute of current space systems lies in their extensive view of the 

Earth."26 Spacepower is able to provide global coverage with relatively few assets. 

• "A corollary to this attribute is that a space vehicle is in sight of vast areas of 

Earth's surface."27 Spacepower can be vulnerable due to a lack of natural cover in 

space, though sheer distance can afford some protection. 

• "Space exists as a distinct medium."28 At the tactical and operational levels of war, 

space is most certainly a distinct medium, though it should be noted that there is 

nothing about space that places it beyond strategy. The nature of spacepower is 

the use, or threatened use, of space systems for political purposes. 

• "Space power, alone, is insufficient to control the outcome of terrestrial conflict 

or ensure the attainment of terrestrial political objectives."29 The same is true of 

air- and seapower. The seat of political power for all polities resides on the land, 

where people live. Control of such power can only be ultimately won or lost by 

controlling land. Spacepower, along with air- and seapower, can help leverage—

even critically—land power to achieve victory on land, but can never do so by 

itself. An exception to this may come about should human beings colonize other 

celestial bodies, such as the Moon or Mars. In that event, one might see 

spacepower take the lead role in delivering sovereign effects, with other forms of 

military power (especially land and airpower delivered by a preponderant 

spacepower) providing support. 

• "Space power has developed, for the most part, without human presence in space, 

making it unique among other forms of national power."30 Space-power is unique 

in that, for the time being at least, it is the only form of military power that 

generates strategic effect through robotic proxies. Whether this situation will 

change in the future with manned platforms performing the spacepower mission 

remains to be seen, and will be subject to myriad factors. However, the trend in 

the air and sea environments among the assorted militaries of the industrialized 

world is toward unmanned platforms. 

• "Technological competence is required to become a space power, and conversely, 

technological benefits are derived from being a space power."31 As space 

technologies disseminate throughout the world at a rapid pace, Oberg reminds us 

that true spacepower is that which can be organically sustained rather than 

purchased on the open market. It may prove critical to be able to develop, 

manufacture, launch, and operate one's own space-power without having to rely 

upon a third party for technological expertise. Technological competence in this 

area undoubtedly will have strategic benefits as well as economic ones. 

• "As with the earth-bound media [land, sea, and air], the weaponization of space is 

inevitable, though the manner and timing are not at all predictable."32 Because 

spacepower is not beyond strategy, so it is not beyond the fate that has befallen 

every other environment that humankind has exploited. We may debate the 

desirability of space weaponization as a policy option in the near and mid-term, 
and, indeed, what that may or may not look like, but weaponization in one form or 

another will happen. 

• "Situational awareness in space is a key to successful application of space 

power."33 Space situational awareness at present is sketchy at best, and yet it is 

required in order to carry out many of the simplest and most mundane spacepower 

functions, as well as to be able to distinguish between natural hazards and 

intentional threats or interference. 

• "Control of space is the linchpin upon which a nation's space power depends."34 In 

fact, Oberg does not reach far enough here. Because terrestrially based armed 

forces have become so space-dependent, the control of space will become 

critically important for a nation's land, air-, and seapower, not just spacepower. 

Oberg's Space Power Theory should be viewed as an initial foray into theory-making. It 

does not meet our Mahanian criteria in that it lacks a comprehensiveness that links 

spacepower to national power in a manner that elucidates the nature of spacepower, and 

perhaps overly focuses on the technological dimension at the expense of others. Given 

that Oberg courageously stepped into the breach at the last minute of a troubled project 

sponsored by the then–Unified U.S. Space Command, Space Power Theory has aged not 

too badly, and provides sturdy shoulders upon which others may climb. 

Everett Dolman 

Everett Dolman's Astropolitik has been the most controversial book to appear on 

spacepower in recent years and yet, in many respects, is perhaps the most rigorous 

intellectually. Dolman posits spacepower within a classical geopolitical model based on 

the works of geopolitical theorists such as Mahan, Halford Mackinder, and Nicholas 

Spykman, among others.35 His analysis finds that certain points in space may prove 

strategically advantageous to those powers that would control them. These points include 

low Earth orbit (LEO), geostationary orbit, Hohmann orbital transfers, and the Libration 

points L4 and L5 between the Earth and the Moon.36 Others, such as Dandridge Cole and 

Simon "Pete" Worden,37 have made similar arguments in the past, but not with the 

intellectual power that Dolman has mustered. 

Dolman's signal contribution to the field is his outstanding explanation of the 

geographical and geopolitical relationships between space-power and land, air-, and 

seapower. The assertion made by Dolman that the United States should seize LEO 

(unilaterally if necessary) in order to preserve a liberal global order is questionable in 

intent and implausible,38 although a U.S.-led alliance might feasibly have a more 

legitimate claim to controlling LEO for more attainable and realistic goals. Similarly, 

Dolman may yet be proven right in his claim that the current outer space legal regime has 

stifled healthy competition in space that may have brought about more robust military 

and civil space capabilities, although blaming the failure of the space age to materialize 

solely on the space regime can come across as reductionism.39 

Dolman has done the field a great service with Astropolitik. He fearlessly questions 

spacepower's sacred cows and throws down an intellectual gauntlet in the process. This 
said, Dolman's work cannot lay claim to be a comprehensive theory of spacepower, as its 

argument only resonates in the United States and lacks the universalism that marks all 

great works of strategic theory. Furthermore, Astropolitik's durability may arise from its 

controversial assertions rather than from any overt attempt by Dolman to speak to the 

ages. Many of the policy concerns rightly raised by Dolman are unlikely to be of any 

broad interest to an audience seeking strategic guidance in the future. 

John Klein 

In Klein's Space Warfare, we see the first comprehensive attempt to apply a strategic 

analogy to spacepower. Klein takes Sir Julian Corbett's Some Principles of Maritime 

Strategy and applies it to spacepower, with mixed success. Corbett advocated a maritime 

approach to strategy that emphasized the interaction between land and seapower. Klein 

takes this a step further and advocates a spacepower version of maritime strategy that 

emphasizes the strategic interaction of spacepower with land, air-, and seapower.40 The 

application, in broad terms, of Corbettian concepts of limited liability in war and the 

temporary nature of control to spacepower is useful, but when Klein seeks to apply the 

same framework to concepts such as offense, defense, concentration, and dispersal, the 

real limitations of the Corbettian strategic analogy are revealed. 

The term strategic analogy is new, yet its theoretical roots can be found in the 

scholarship on historical analogies in statecraft and policymaking. An analogy "signifies 

an inference that if two or more things agree in one respect, then they might also agree in 

another."41 Based on this definition, among others, a definition for the strategic analogy 

can be extrapolated. If two or more strategic environments separated, among other things, 

by time (though this is not a necessary criterion; strategic analogies may be used 

contemporaneously), geographical characteristics, doctrine, technology, culture, and 

political context agree in one respect, then they may also agree in another. Scholars, 

policymakers, military planners, and commanders use strategic analogies to provide a 

rational means for the comprehension and planning of novel strategic environments by 

retrieving information, principles, and past experiences from other, more established 

strategic environments and applying them to the new, unfamiliar strategic environment. 

In short, strategic analogies may provide a "shortcut to rationality"42 in new and poorly 

understood strategic environments where there is little or no known strategic experience 

or established principles for effective operations. Strategic analogies are similar to 

historical analogies, except that the former use the strategic experiences and theories of 

other environments—such as the sea and the air—rather than the specific and particular 

historical events used in the latter. A strategic analogy may state that nascent spacepower 

is similar to seapower in several key respects, and then may infer that because of this it 

must be similar in other respects. A strategic analogy uses the body of theory and 

principles that has developed over the years, as well as the strategic history of the 

environment (land, sea, air) in question. 

Klein's Space Warfare is an exercise in making strategic analogies and as a result reveals 

the limitations of this process. To be fair, Klein does state that "space is a unique 

environment, and any historically based strategic framework—whether naval, air, or 
maritime—cannot realistically be taken verbatim in its application to space strategy. Only 

the most fundamental concepts of maritime strategy, therefore, will and should be used to 

derive the strategic principles of space warfare."43 Yet despite this acknowledgment, 

Klein at times seems to make the reality fit the theory, or at the very least, let the theory 

gloss over awkward facts. For example, Klein overreaches in his discussion of 

spacepower dispersal and concentration, where it is far from clear whether he is speaking 

about the dispersal and concentration of actual satellites (impossible, given the 

constraints of orbital dynamics) or the dispersal and concentration of effects generated by 

space-power (which is plausible).44 

The use of strategic analogies is a necessary step on the road to creating and developing 

an enduring and universal theory of spacepower. Problems arise, however, when we 

become overreliant on strategic analogies at the expense of critical thinking. Strategic 

analogies should be nothing more than a cognitive crutch that allows us to ask the right 

questions of spacepower. We shall make progress in theorymaking when we kick away 

these crutches and engage our critical faculties to start the process of inductive reasoning. 

Guide for the Future 

The authors discussed above have all made valuable contributions to a theory of 

spacepower. Even their mistakes and omissions are useful, as they allow those of us who 

follow to climb on their shoulders and adjust the theoretical framework accordingly. We 

are forced to address and correct their mistakes and omissions, and future theorists will 

have to rectify ours. Truly, a Mahan for the space age may yet appear, but in lieu of such 

a person, it is perhaps prudent to assume that the continued development of a theory of 

spacepower will be a team effort that will build on the labors of others that have gone 

before. It may seem churlish to critique these works, but criticism is made with gratitude 

to those who have intellectually dared, and the theory of spacepower ultimately will be 

best served by constantly striving through honest debate. 

With these sentiments in mind, we offer our own thoughts on a theory of spacepower for 

others to ruminate upon, critique, and, ultimately and hopefully, improve in their own 

turn. Many of the thoughts offered here have been asserted before by us but are worth 

repeating for their strategic value. 

Space is a Place 

The idea that space can redeem human sin still persists in many quarters. The reason for 

this persistence is as much about the perception of space as a place, and what that place 

purports to represent, as it is about the technologies required for its manned and 

unmanned exploration and use. This particular way of framing space can be described as 

astrofuturism, which "posits the space frontier as a site of renewal, a place where we can 

resolve the domestic and global battles that have paralyzed our progress on earth."45 We 

believe that space as a place is no different from the land, sea, and air, and we reject the 

astrofuturist credo as a fallacy. Human beings and their robotic proxies operate and (in 

the case of the land) live every day in these environments, carrying out myriad functions 
from the spiritual and artistic to the martial (and these are by no means mutually 

exclusive). 

Our entry into space must respect the human condition in its entirety, good and bad, and 

attempts to redeem human nature through the wonders of technology or hopes that the 

infinite expanse of space will offer the opportunity to unite humankind where our 

existence on Earth has failed are bound to disappoint. It is tragic but true that "short of a 

revolution in the heart of man and the nature of states, by what miracle could 

interplanetary space be preserved from military use?"46 

Strategy, Eternal and Universal 

In the quest for a theory of spacepower, it is perhaps wise to first state categorically what 

such a theory should not be. In particular, a theory of spacepower should not be at odds 

with the universal and eternal logic of strategy. Instead, it should be a theory of its use in 

the service of strategy. Edward N. Luttwak points out that to postulate such a thing as 

"nuclear strategy," "naval strategy," or, in this case, "space strategy" is to argue that each 

of these kinds of strategy is somehow fundamentally different from the strategy that 

governs them all. Luttwak writes, "If there were such a thing as naval strategy or air 

strategy or nuclear strategy in any sense other than a conflation of the technical, tactical, 

or operational levels of the same universal strategy, then each should have its own 

peculiar logic."47 A theory of spacepower should not claim such a "peculiar logic," and 

the foundations for this theory should be cognizant and respectful of a superior and 

overarching logic of strategy. 

Sir Julian Corbett wrote of the purpose of theory in strategy: 

It is a process by which we co-ordinate our ideas, define the meaning of 

the words we use, grasp the difference between essential and unessential 

factors, and fix and expose the fundamental data on which every one is 

agreed. In this way we prepare the apparatus of practical discussion; we 

secure the means of arranging the factors in manageable shape, and of 

deducing from them with precision and rapidity a practical course of 

action. Without such an apparatus no two men can even think on the same 

line; much less can they ever hope to detach the real point of difference 

that divides them and isolate it for quiet solution.48 

Given the relative infancy of spacepower, it is important that sensible theoretical 

foundations be established. Spacepower has made itself ubiquitous in modern war and 

statecraft, yet discerning a strategic experience of spacepower has proved to be 

notoriously difficult. Over time, strategic experience will doubtless accumulate, and so 

eventually a comprehensive theory of spacepower will develop and evolve synergistically 

with its actual practice. Although spacepower is relatively new, the need for theory is not. 

As Corbett's thoughts suggest, a theory of spacepower should provide a common 

framework from which all can refer and a conceptual means by which spacepower is 

exploited to its full potential in order to attain policy objectives. 
Pragmatism 

That said, a theory of spacepower must guard against a creeping inflexibility and 

orthodoxy that stifle innovative thinking or constructive criticism. It will evolve along 

with its actual use, and it may be found that some tenets of spacepower thought are in fact 

wrong. A theory of space-power must also guard against flights of fancy and overactive 

imaginations that make theory useless as a guide to practice. Spacepower could be 

especially susceptible to such problems given that it is, conceptually, a blank canvas and 

is bound up for many people with science fiction. Spacepower is not science fiction, and 

its intellectual guardians, the theorists, much like the protagonists in the "widening gyre" 

of W.B. Yeats's "The Second Coming" who are either "lacking all conviction" or are "full 

of passionate intensity,"49 must take care to protect it from the ignorance of some and the 

worst excesses of others. Theorists of spacepower, and practitioners who would read such 

theory, must always be mindful of the fact that strategy "is nothing if not pragmatic," and 

that "strategic theory is a theory for action."50 A theory of spacepower that is disrespectful 

of the practicalities of spaceflight and orbitology, the limits of technology, and the 

eternal, universal workings of strategy could be worse than useless; it could be 

dangerous. 

The Nature of Spacepower 

To repeat, spacepower is not beyond the logic of strategy, nor can it be. Strategy is 

eternal in its nature and logic, and while the grammar and character of strategy evolve 

because of changes in their many dimensions such as society, politics, and technology, 

strategy's fundamental nature does not. Spacepower is subject to the nature of strategy 

and always will be. The nature of spacepower is simply the ability to use space for 

political purposes, and that too will never change. John G. Fox is only partially correct 

when he states, "The nature and character of space warfare 50 years from now may be 

wholly unrecognizable to those of us alive today."51 Fox is probably correct in that the 

character of spacepower will change over the next 50 years, due perhaps to unforeseen 

technological developments. He is wrong, however, to state that the nature of 

spacepower is changeable; it is not. So long as humankind possesses the ability to exploit 

the space environment, then the nature of spacepower is immutable and impervious to 

societal, political, economic, technological, or any other kind of change. 

Conclusion 

This chapter has sought to elucidate the very real problems of creating and developing a 

theory of spacepower. The impediments are varied and tangible, but many of them apply 

equally to theorymaking for other military instruments. The crux of the matter is that 

strategy is difficult and so, therefore, is creating and developing a theory of spacepower. 

A true theory of spacepower will be able to account for its role in modern war and 

statecraft, as well as how it interacts with other instruments of power, and this chapter has 

sought to provide the would-be theorist with food for thought.
Notes

1. Colin S. Gray, "The Influence of Space Power upon History," Comparative Strategy 15, no. 4 

(October–December 1996), 307. 

2. Ibid., 304. 

3. Colin S. Gray, Modern Strategy (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1999), 17. 

4. B.H. Liddell Hart, Strategy, 2d rev. ed. (New York: Signet, 1974), 322. 

5. Colin S. Gray and John B. Sheldon, "Spacepower and the Revolution in Military Affairs: A Glass 

Half-Full?" in Spacepower for a New Millennium: Space and U.S. National Security, ed. Peter L. 

Hays, James M. Smith, Alan R. Van Tassel, and Guy M. Walsh (New York: McGraw-Hill, 2000), 

254. 

6. A growing number of countries are realizing the benefits and challenges of spacepower. Among 

them are the People's Republic of China, India, Brazil, South Korea, Israel, France, Germany, 

Italy, Nigeria, and Iran. See the special issue of Astropolitics 4, no. 2 (Summer 2006), for essays 

on the implications of rising spacepowers. 

7. With the exception of Sun Tzu, Thucydides, and Vegetius, of course. On the evolution of military 

theory in the modern period, see Azar Gat, A History of Military Thought: From the 

Enlightenment to the Cold War (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2001). 

8. See Baron Antoine Henri de Jomini, The Art of War (London: Greenhill Books, 1992); and Carl 

von Clausewitz, On War, ed. and trans. Michael Howard and Peter Paret (Princeton: Princeton 

University Press, 1984). 

9. See, among his other works, Alfred Thayer Mahan, The Influence of Sea Power Upon History, 

1660–1783 (Boston: Little, Brown, 1890); Julian S. Corbett, Some Principles of Maritime 

Strategy, introduction and notes by Eric J. Grove (Annapolis, MD: Naval Institute Press, 1988); 

C.E. Callwell, Military Operations and Maritime Preponderance, ed. and introduced by Colin S. 

Gray (Annapolis, MD: Naval Institute Press, 1996); and Raoul Castex, Strategic Theories, trans., 

ed., and introduced by Eugenia C. Kiesling (Annapolis, MD: Naval Institute Press, 1993). 

10. See Giulio Douhet, The Command of the Air, trans. Dino Ferrari (Washington, DC: Air Force 

History and Museums Program, 1998); William Mitchell, Winged Defense: The Development and 

Possibilities of Modern Air Power, Economic and Military (Mineola, NY: Dover Publications, 

1988); Wing Commander J.C. Slessor, RAF, Air Power and Armies (London: Oxford University 

Press, 1936); and Colonel John A. Warden III, USAF, The Air Campaign: Planning for Combat 

(Washington, DC: Brassey's, 1989). 

11. David MacIsaac, "Voices from the Central Blue: The Air Power Theorists," in Makers of Modern 

Strategy: From Machiavelli to the Nuclear Age, ed. Peter Paret (Princeton: Princeton University 

Press, 1986), 624. 

12. Harold R. Winton, "A Black Hole in the Wild Blue Yonder: The Need for a Comprehensive 

Theory of Air Power," Air Power History 39, no. 4 (Winter 1992), 32. 

13. Ibid., 32–33. 

14. MacIsaac, 625. 

15. Gray, Modern Strategy, 205. See also David Jablonsky, "Why Is Strategy Difficult," in The Search 

for Strategy: Politics and Strategic Vision, ed. Gary L. Guertner (Westport, CT: Greenwood Press, 

1993), 3–45; and David J. Lonsdale, "Strategy: The Challenge of Complexity," Defence Studies 7, 

no. 1 (March 2007), 42–64. 

16. A point also made in Gray and Sheldon, "Spacepower and the Revolution in Military Affairs: A 

Glass Half Full?" 239–257. 

17. See, for example, Alan Beyerchen, "Clausewitz, Nonlinearity, and the Unpredictability of War," 

International Security 17, no. 3 (Winter 1992/1993), 59–90. 

18. See Colin S. Gray, Weapons for Strategic Effect: How Important Is Technology? Occasional Paper 

No. 21 (Maxwell Air Force Base, AL: Center for Strategy and Technology, Air War College, 

January 2001) for an exposition on the limits of technology. 

19. Clausewitz, On War, 119. 

20. Lonsdale, 42. 
21. James Oberg, Space Power Theory (Washington, DC: U.S. Government Printing Office, 1999); 

Everett C. Dolman, Astropolitik: Classical Geopolitics in the Space Age (London: Frank Cass, 

2002); and John J. Klein, Space Warfare: Strategy, Principles, and Policy (New York: Routledge, 

2006). 

22. Oberg, 1–22. 

23. Ibid., 43–66. 

24. Ibid., 67–86, but also the very useful appendices. 

25. Ibid., 124. 

26. Ibid. 

27. Ibid. 

28. Ibid., 126. 

29. Ibid., 127. 

30. Ibid. 

31. Ibid., 128. 

32. Ibid., 129. 

33. Ibid., 130. 

34. Ibid. 

35. See, in particular, Dolman, 12–59. 

36. Ibid., especially 60–85. 

37. See G. Harry Stine, Confrontation in Space (Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall, 1981), for a 

discussion of Dandridge Cole's "Panama Canal" spacepower theory, and Simon P. Worden and 

Bruce J. Jackson, "Space, Power, and Strategy," The National Interest, no. 13 (Fall 1988), 43–52, 

for a similar "High Ground" view. 

38. Dolman, 86–112. 

39. Ibid., 113–144. 

40. Klein, 44–50. 

41. David Hackett Fischer, Historian's Fallacies: Toward a Logic of Historical Thought (New York: 

Harper and Row, 1970), 243. 

42. Robert Jervis, Perception and Misperception in International Politics (Princeton: Princeton 

University Press, 1976), 220. 

43. Klein, 20. 

44. Ibid., 107–115. 

45. De Witt Douglas Kilgore, Astrofuturism: Science, Race and Visions of Utopia in Space 

(Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2003), 2. 

46. Raymond Aron, Peace and War: A Theory of International Relations, trans. Richard Howard and 

Annette Baker Fox (London: Weidenfeld and Nicolson, 1966), 664. 

47. Edward N. Luttwak, Strategy: The Logic of War and Peace (Cambridge: The Belknap Press of 

Harvard University Press, 1995), 156. 

48. Corbett, 7. 

49. With our sincerest apologies to the Bard of Sligo, see W.B. Yeats, "The Second Coming," in The 

Collected Poems of W.B. Yeats (New York: The Macmillan Company, 1952), 184–185. 

50. Bernard Brodie, War and Politics (New York: The Macmillan Company, 1973), 452. 

51. John G. Fox, "Some Principles of Space Strategy (or 'Corbett in Orbit')," Space Policy 17, no. 1 

(February 2001), 7–11. 
Chapter 16:

Airpower, Spacepower, and Cyberpower

Benjamin S. Lambeth

When American airpower played such a central role in driving Iraq's occupying forces 

from Kuwait in early 1991, many doubters of its seemingly demonstrated capacity to 

shape the course and outcome of a major showdown independently of ground action 

tended to dismiss that remarkable performance as a one-of-a-kind force employment 

anomaly. It was, the doubters said, the clear and open desert environment, or the unusual 

vulnerability of Iraq's concentrated armored formations to precision air attacks, or any 

number of other unique geographic and operational circumstances that somehow made 

the Persian Gulf War an exception to the general rule that it takes "boots on the ground" 

in large numbers, and ultimately in head-to-head combat, to defeat well-endowed enemy 

forces in high-intensity warfare. 

To many, that line of argument had a reasonable ring of plausibility when airpower's 

almost singular contribution to the defeat of Saddam Hussein's forces was an 

unprecedented historical achievement. During the 12 years that ensued in the wake of 

Operation Desert Storm, however, the world again saw American airpower prevail in 

broadly comparable fashion in four dissimilar subsequent cases, starting with the North 

Atlantic Treaty Organization's two air-centric contests over the Balkans in Operations 

Deliberate Force in 1995 and Allied Force in 1999 and followed soon thereafter by 

Operation Enduring Freedom against terrorist elements in Afghanistan in 2001–2002 and 

by the 3-week period of major combat in Operation Iraqi Freedom that ended Saddam 

Hussein's rule in 2003. Granted, in none of those five instances did the air weapon 

produce the ultimate outcome all by itself. However, one can fairly argue that in each 

case, successful aerial combat and support operations were the pivotal enablers of all else

that followed in producing the sought-after results at a relatively low cost in friendly and 

noncombatant enemy lives lost. 

In light of those collective achievements, what was demonstrated by American air assets 

between 1991 and 2003 was arguably not a succession of anomalies, but rather the bow 

wave of a fundamentally new American approach to force employment in which the air 

weapon consistently turned in a radically improved level of performance compared to 

what it had previously delivered to joint force commanders. Indeed, that newly emergent 

pattern has now become so pronounced and persistent as to suggest that American 

airpower has finally reached the brink of maturity and become the tool of first resort by 

combatant commanders, at least with respect to defeating large enemy force 

concentrations in high-intensity warfare. Yet in each of the five instances noted above, 

what figured so importantly in determining the course and outcome of events was not just 

airpower narrowly defined, but rather operations conducted in, through, and from the 

Earth's atmosphere backstopped and enabled, in some cases decisively, by the Nation's 
diverse additional assets in space and by operations conducted within cyberspace (that is, 

the electromagnetic spectrum). 

Accordingly, any effort to understand the evolving essence of American airpower must 

take into account not only our aerial warfare assets, but also those vitally important space 

and cyberspace adjuncts that, taken together, have made possible the new American way 

of war. By the same token, any successful effort to build a theoretical framework for 

better charting the future direction and use of American air, space, and cyberspace 

warfare capability must first take due measure of the Nation's current state of 

advancement in each domain. Toward that end, the discussion that follows will offer a 

brief overview of where the United States stands today in each of the three operating 

mediums. It will then consider some pertinent lessons from the airpower experience that 

bear on the development of spacepower and cyberpower theory, along with the sorts of 

cross-domain synergies that should be pursued in the many areas where the air, space, 

and cyberspace arenas overlap. Finally, it will consider some essential steps that will 

need to be taken toward that end before a holistic theory of warfare in all three domains, 

let alone any separate and distinct theory of spacepower, can realistically be developed. 

Recent Achievements in Airpower Application 

By any measure, the role of airpower in shaping the course and outcome of the 1991 

Persian Gulf War reflected a major breakthrough in the effectiveness of the Nation's air 

arm after a promising start in World War II and more than 3 years of misuse in the 

Rolling Thunder bombing campaign against North Vietnam from 1965 to 1968. At 

bottom, the Desert Storm experience confirmed that since Vietnam, American airpower 

had undergone a nonlinear growth in its ability to contribute to the outcome of joint 

campaigns at the operational and strategic levels thanks to a convergence of low 

observability to enemy sensors in the F–117 stealth attack aircraft, the ability to attack 

fixed targets consistently with high accuracy from relatively safe standoff distances using 

precision-guided munitions, and the expanded battlespace awareness that had been made 

possible by recent developments in command, control, communications, and computers, 

and intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance (ISR).1 

As a result of those developments, American airpower had finally acquired the 

capabilities needed to fulfill the longstanding promise of its pioneers of being able to set 

the conditions for winning in joint warfare— yet not through the classic imposition of 

brute force, as had been the case throughout most of airpower's history, but rather 

through the functional effects that were now achievable by targeting an enemy's 

vulnerabilities and taking away his capacity for organized action. The combination of 

real-time surveillance and precision target–attack capability that was exercised to such 

telling effect by airpower against Iraq's fielded ground forces in particular heralded a new 

relationship between air- and surface-delivered firepower, in which friendly ground 

forces did the fixing and friendly airpower, now the predominant maneuver element, did 

the killing of enemy troops rather than the other way around. 
During the years immediately after the 1991 Gulf War, further qualitative improvements 

rendered the Nation's air weapon even more capable than it had been. For one thing, 

almost every American combat aircraft now possessed the ability to deliver precisionguided weapons. For another, the advent of stealth, as was first demonstrated on a 

significant scale by the F–117 during the Gulf War, was further advanced by the 

subsequent deployment of the Air Force's second-generation B–2 stealth bomber that 

entered operational service in 1993. Finally, the advent of the satellite-aided GBU–31 

Joint Direct Attack Munition (JDAM) gave joint force commanders the ability to conduct 

accurate target attacks with near impunity, around the clock and in any weather, against 

an opponent's core concentrations of power, whether they be deployed forces or 

infrastructure assets. 

In the three subsequent major wars that saw American combat involvement (Operations 

Allied Force, Enduring Freedom, and the major combat phase of Iraqi Freedom), the 

dominant features of allied air operations were persistence of pressure on the enemy and 

rapidity of execution, thanks to the improved data fusion that had been enabled by linking 

the inputs of various air- and space-based sensor platforms around the clock. Greater 

communications connectivity and substantially increased available bandwidth enabled 

constant surveillance of enemy activity and contributed significantly to shortening the 

sensor-to-shooter data cycle time. Throughout each campaign, persistent ISR and 

growing use of precision munitions gave the United States the ability to deny the enemy a 

sanctuary. More important, they also reflected an ongoing paradigm shift in American 

combat style that now promises to be of greater moment than was the introduction of the 

tank at the beginning of the 20th century.2 

Unlike the earlier joint campaigns that preceded it since Desert Storm, the second Gulf 

War involving the United States in 2003 was not mainly an air war, even though 

offensive air operations played a pivotal role in setting the conditions for its highly 

successful immediate outcome. Neither, however, was the campaign predominantly a 

ground combat affair, despite the fact that nearly all subsequent assessments of it have 

tended to misrepresent it in such a manner. That misrepresentation largely resulted from 

host-nation sensitivities that precluded correspondents from being embedded with 

forward-deployed allied flying units, and especially in the coalition's Combined Air 

Operations Center at Prince Sultan Air Base, Saudi Arabia, from which most of the air 

war was commanded and conducted. As a result, most of the journalists who provided 

first-hand reporting on the campaign were attached to allied ground formations. 

Yet the ground offensive could not have been conducted with such speed and relatively 

small loss of friendly life (only 108 American military personnel lost to direct enemy 

action) without the indispensable contribution of the air component in establishing air 

supremacy over Iraq and then beating down enemy ground forces until they lost both the 

capacity and the will to continue fighting. By the same token, the rapid allied ground 

advance could not have progressed from Kuwait to Baghdad in just 3 weeks without the 

air component giving ground commanders the confidence that their exposed flanks were 

free of enemy threats on either side, thanks to the success of allied air attacks in keeping 

the enemy pinned down, exposed to relentless hammering from above, and unable to 
fight as a coherent entity. That omnipresent ISR eye over the war zone gave allied ground 

commanders not just the proverbial ability to "see over the next hill," but also a highfidelity picture of the entire Iraqi battlespace. 

In its execution of the major combat phase of Iraqi Freedom, U.S. Central Command 

(USCENTCOM) enjoyed air and information dominance essentially from the campaign's 

opening moments. Moreover, during the ensuing 3 weeks of joint and combined combat, 

allied air operations featured the application of mass precision as a matter of course. In 

the initial attack waves, every air-delivered weapon was precision-guided. Even well into 

the war's first week, 80 percent of USCENTCOM's air-delivered munitions had been 

either satellite-aided or laser-guided. In addition, the 3-week campaign featured a more 

closely linked joint and combined force than ever before. Persistent ISR coupled with a 

precision strike capability by all participating combat aircraft allowed the air component 

to deliver discriminant effects throughout the battlespace, essentially on demand. In 

contributing to the campaign, allied airpower did not just "support" allied land operations 

by "softening up" enemy forces. More often than not, it conducted wholesale destruction 

of Iraqi ground forces both prior to and independently of allied ground action. The 

intended net effect of allied air operations, which was ultimately achieved, was to 

facilitate the quickest possible capture of Baghdad without the occurrence of any major 

head-to-head land battles between allied and Iraqi ground forces. 

As attested by its consistently effective performance from Desert Storm onward, 

American airpower has been steadily transformed since Vietnam to a point where it has 

finally become truly strategic in its potential effects. That was not the case before the 

advent of stealth, highly accurate target attack capability, and substantially improved 

information availability. Earlier air offensives were of limited effectiveness at the 

operational and strategic levels because it took too many aircraft and too high a loss rate 

to achieve too few results. Today, in contrast, American airpower can make its presence 

felt quickly and from the outset of combat and can impose effects on an enemy that can 

have a determining influence on the subsequent course and outcome of a joint campaign. 

To begin with, thanks to the newly acquired capabilities of American airpower, there is 

no longer a need to mass force as there was even in the recent past. Today, improved 

battlespace awareness, heightened aircraft survivability, and increased weapons accuracy 

have made possible the effects of massing without an air component actually having to do 

so. As a result, airpower can now produce effects in major combat that were previously 

unattainable. The only question remaining, unlike in earlier eras, is when those effects 

will be registered, not whether they will be. 

Of course, all force elements—land and maritime as well as air—have increasingly 

gained the opportunity in principle, at the theater commander's discretion, to achieve such 

effects by making the most of new technologies and concepts of operations.What is 

distinctive about contemporary fixed-wing airpower in all Services, however, is that it 

has pulled ahead of surface force elements in both the land and maritime arenas in its 

relative capacity to do this, thanks not only to its lately acquired advantages of stealth, 

precision, and information dominance, but also to its abiding characteristics of speed, 
range, and flexibility. Current and emerging air employment options now offer theater 

commanders the possibility of neutralizing an enemy's military forces from standoff 

ranges with virtual impunity, thus reducing the threat to U.S. troops who might otherwise 

have to engage undegraded enemy forces directly and risk sustaining high casualties as a 

result. They also offer the potential for achieving strategic effects from the earliest 

moments of a joint campaign through their ability to attack an enemy's core 

vulnerabilities with both shock and simultaneity. 

In sum, a variety of distinctive features of American airpower have converged over the 

past two decades to make the Nation's air arm fairly describable as transformed in 

comparison to what it could offer joint force commanders throughout most of its previous 

history. Those distinctive features include such tangible and intangible equities as: 

• intercontinental-range bombers and fighters with persistence 

• a tanker force that can sustain global strike 

• a sustainable global mobility capability 

• surgeable carrier strike groups able to operate as a massed force3 

• an increasingly digitized and interlinked force 

• unsurpassed ISR and a common operating picture for all 

• air operations centers as weapons systems in themselves 

• operator competence and skill second to none. 

These airpower equities have, in turn, enabled the following unique operational qualities 

and performance capabilities: 

• freedom from attack and freedom to attack 

• situation awareness dominance 

• independence from shore basing for many theater strike requirements

• unobserved target approach and attack through stealth 

• consistently accurate target attack day or night and in any weather 

• the ability to maintain constant pressure on an enemy, perform 

• time-sensitive targeting routinely, and avoid causing collateral damage routinely. 

As borne out by their pivotal contributions to the Nation's five major combat experiences 

over the preceding decade and a half, these and related developments have made possible 

a new way of war for the United States, at least with respect to high-intensity operations 

against organized and concentrated enemy forces in land and maritime theaters. As has 

become increasingly clear since the successful conclusion of the 3-week major combat 

phase of Iraqi Freedom in April 2003, however, mastering the sorts of lower intensity 

counterinsurgency challenges that have dominated more recent headlines with regard to 

continuing combat operations in Iraq and Afghanistan remains another matter, and one 

that highlights modern airpower's limitations as well as strengths. Although today's 

instruments of air warfare have thoroughly transformed the Nation's ability to excel in 

conventional warfare, those instruments and their associated concepts of operations have 

not yet shown comparable potential in irregular warfare, since irregular opponents, given 

their composition and tactics, are less vulnerable to airpower as currently configured and 
employed. (On the other side of the coin, it should be noted in this regard that the recent 

rise of irregular warfare by the Nation's opponents has been substantially a result of 

airpower's proven effectiveness in conventional warfare, a fact that attests to modern 

airpower's unprecedented leverage at the same time that it illuminates the continuing 

challenges that airpower faces.) 

Space Contributions and Near-term Priorities 

Thus far in this discussion, the space medium and its associated mission areas have not 

been examined in any detail. Yet both have figured prominently and indispensably in the 

steady maturation of American air-power that has occurred since Vietnam. If there is a 

single fundamental and distinctive advantage that mature American airpower has 

conferred upon theater commanders in recent years, it has been an increasingly 

pronounced degree of freedom from attack and freedom to attack for all force elements, 

both in the air and on the ground, in major combat operations. The contributions of the 

Nation's space systems with respect to both ISR and precision attack have figured 

prominently in making those two force-employment virtues possible. Although still in its 

adolescence compared to our more mature air warfare posture, the Nation's everimproving space capability has nonetheless become the enabler that has made possible 

the new strategy of precision engagement. 

Despite that and other contributions from the multitude of military assets now on orbit, 

however, the Nation's air warfare repertoire still has a way to go before its post-Vietnam 

maturation can be considered complete. Advances in space-based capabilities on the ISR 

front will lie at the heart of the full and final transformation of American airpower. It is 

now almost a cliché to say that airpower can kill essentially anything it can see, identify, 

and engage. To note one of the few persistent and unrectified shortfalls in airpower's 

leverage, however, it can kill only what it can see, identify, and engage. Airpower and 

actionable real-time target intelligence are thus opposite sides of the same coin. If the 

latter is unavailing in circumstances in which having it is essential for mission success, 

the former will likely be unavailing also. For that reason, accurate, timely, and 

comprehensive information about an enemy and his military assets is not only a crucial 

enabler for airpower to produce pivotal results in joint warfare, it also is an indispensable 

precondition for ensuring such results. In this regard, it will be in substantial measure 

through near-term improvements in space-based capabilities that the Air Force's longsought ability to find, fix, track, target, engage, and assess any target of interest on the 

face of the Earth will become an established reality rather than merely a catchy vision 

statement with great promise.4 

The spectrum of military space missions starts with space support, which essentially 

entails the launching of satellites and the day-to-day management of on-orbit assets that 

underpin all military space operations. It next includes force enhancement, a broader 

category of operations involving all space-based activities aimed at increasing the 

effectiveness of terrestrial military operations. This second mission area embraces the 

range of space-related enabling services that the Nation's various on-orbit assets now 

provide to U.S. joint force commanders worldwide. Activities in this second area include 
missile attack warning and characterization, navigation, weather forecasting, 

communication, ISR, and around-the-clock global positioning system (GPS) operations. 

A particularly notable aspect of space force enhancement in recent years has been the 

growing use of space-based systems for directly enabling, rather than merely enhancing, 

terrestrial military operations, as attested by the increasing reliance by all four Services 

on GPS signals for accurate, all-weather delivery of satellite-aided JDAMs. 

To date, the American defense establishment has largely limited its space operations to 

these two rather basic and purely enabling mission areas. Once the third mission area, 

space control, develops into a routine operational practice, it will involve the direct 

imposition of kinetic and nonkinetic effects both within and through space. Conceptually, 

space control is analogous to the familiar notions of sea and air control, both of which 

likewise involve ensuring friendly access and denying enemy access to those mediums. 

Viewed purely from a tactical and technical perspective, there is no difference in 

principle between defensive and offensive space control operations and similar operations 

conducted in any other medium of warfare. It is simply a matter of desirability, technical 

feasibility, and cost-effectiveness for the payoff being sought. 

Unlike the related cases of sea and air control, however, serious investment in space 

control has been slow to take place in the United States, in part due to a persistent lack of 

governmental and public consensus as to whether actual combat, as opposed to merely 

passive surveillance and other terrestrial enabling functions, should be allowed to migrate 

into space and thus violate its presumed status as a weapons-free sanctuary. The delay 

also has had to do with the fact that the United States has not, at least until recently, faced 

direct threats to its on-orbit assets that have needed to be met by determined investment 

in active space control measures, all the more so in light of more immediate and pressing 

research and development and systems procurement priorities. For both reasons, the 

space control mission area remains almost completely undeveloped. About all the United 

States can do today to deny enemy access to the data stream from space is through 

electronic jamming or by physically destroying satellite uplinks and downlinks on the 

ground. 

Finally, the force application mission, which thus far remains completely undeveloped 

due to both widespread international disapprobation and a general absence of political 

and popular domestic support, will eventually entail the direct defensive and offensive 

imposition of kinetic and nonkinetic measures from space in pursuit of joint terrestrial 

combat objectives. In its ultimate hardware manifestations, it could include the 

development, deployment, and use of space-based nonnuclear, hyperkinetic weapons 

against such terrestrial aim points as fixed high-value targets (hardened bunkers, 

munitions storage depots, underground command posts, and other heavily defended 

objectives), as well as against surface naval vessels, armored vehicles, and such other 

targets of interest as enemy leadership. How many years or decades into the future it may 

be before such capabilities are developed and fielded by the United States has been a 

topic of debate among military space professionals for many years. For the time being, it 

seems safe to conclude that any such developments will be heavily threat-determined and 
will not occur, if only from a cost-effectiveness viewpoint, as long as effective airbreathing or other terrestrial alternatives for performing the same missions are available. 

Fortunately, as the Nation's defense community looks toward further developing these

mission areas in an orderly sequence, it can claim the benefit of a substantial foundation 

on which to build. In February 2000, the Defense Science Board (DSB) concluded that 

the United States enjoyed undisputed space dominance, thanks in large part to what the 

Air Force had done in the space support and force enhancement mission areas over the 

preceding four decades to build a thriving military space infrastructure. Air Force 

contributions toward that end expressly cited by the DSB included a robust space launch 

and support infrastructure, an effective indications and warning and attack-assessment 

capability, a unique ground-based space surveillance capability, global near-real-time 

surveillance of denied areas, the ability to disseminate the products of that capability 

rapidly, and a strong command, control, and communications infrastructure for exploiting 

space systems.5 

In looking to build on these existing capabilities with the goal of extracting greater 

leverage from the military promise of space, the Air Force now faces an urgent need to 

prioritize its investment alternatives in an orderly and manageable way. It cannot pursue 

every appealing investment opportunity concurrently, since some capability upgrade 

needs are more urgent than others. These appropriately rank-ordered priorities, moreover, 

must be embraced squarely and unsentimentally by the Nation's leadership. If the 

experience with the successful transformation of American airpower since Vietnam is 

ever to become a prologue to the next steps in the expansion of the Nation's military 

space repertoire, then it follows that the Air Force, as the lead service in space operations, 

will need to get its hierarchy of operational requirements in space right if near-Earth 

space is to be exploited for the greatest gains per cost in the service of theater 

commanders. Because an early working template for an overarching theory of 

spacepower might help impose a rational discipline on the determination of that 

hierarchy, perhaps the pursuit of such a focusing device should be undertaken as one of 

the first building blocks for such a theory. 

Furthermore, a case can reasonably be made that the Nation's next moves with respect to 

military space exploitation should first seek to ensure the further integration of space with 

the needs of terrestrial warfighters, however much that might appear, at least for the near 

term, to shortchange the interests of those who are ready now to make space the fourth 

medium of warfare. More to the point, one can reasonably suggest that if the Nation's 

leadership deems a current space-based capability to be particularly important to the 

effective conduct of joint warfare and that it is either facing block obsolescence or 

otherwise at the threshold of failing, then it should be replaced as a first order of business 

before any other major space investment programs are pursued. Once those most pressing 

recapitalization needs are attended to, then all else by way of investment opportunities 

can be approached in appropriate sequence, including such space-based multispectral ISR 

assets as electro-optical, infrared, and signals intelligence satellites, followed by spacebased radar once the requisite technology has proven itself ready for major resources to 

be committed to it. 
Moreover, in considering an orderly transfer of such ISR functions from the atmosphere 

to space, planners should exercise special caution not to try to change too much too 

quickly. For example, such legacy air-breathing systems as the E–3 Airborne Warning 

and Control System (AWACS) and E–8 Joint Surveillance Target Attack Radar System 

(JSTARS), which have been acquired through billions of dollars of investment, cannot be 

summarily written off with substantial service life remaining, however well intended the 

various arguments for mission migration to space may be. Thus, it may make greater 

sense to think of space not as a venue within which to replace existing surveillance 

functions wholesale, but rather as a medium offering the potential for expanding the 

Nation's existing ISR capability by more fully exploiting both the air and space 

environments. It also may help to think in terms of windows of time in which to 

commence the migration of ISR missions to space. A challenge the Air Force faces now 

in this respect is to determine how to divest itself of existing legacy programs in a 

measured way so as to generate the funds needed for taking on tomorrow's challenges 

one manageable step at a time. That will require careful tradeoff assessments to 

determine the most appropriate technology and medium—air or space—toward which its 

resources should be vectored for any mission at any given time. 

Finally, it will be essential that the survivability of any new ISR assets migrated to space 

be assured by appropriate protective measures that are developed and put into place first. 

American investment in appropriate first-generation space control measures has become 

increasingly essential in order for the Nation to remain secure in the space enabling 

game. Having been active in space operations for more than four decades, the United 

States is more heavily invested in space and more dependent on its on-orbit assets than 

ever before, and both real and potential adversaries are closing in on the ability to 

threaten our space-based assets by means ranging from harassment to neutralization to 

outright destruction, as attested by China's demonstration in January 2007 of a directascent antisatellite kinetic kill capability against one of its own obsolete weather satellites 

500 miles above the Earth's surface.6 As the Nation places more satellites on orbit and 

comes to rely more on them for military applications, it is only a matter of time until our 

enemies become tempted to challenge our freedom of operations in space by attempting 

to undermine them. 

In light of that fact, it would make no sense to migrate the JSTARS and AWACS 

functions to space should the resultant on-orbit assets prove to be any less survivable than 

JSTARS and AWACS are today. It follows that getting more serious about space control 

is not an issue apart from force-enhancement migration, but rather represents a sine qua 

non for such migration. Otherwise, in transferring our asymmetric technological 

advantages to space, we will also run the risk of burdening ourselves with new 

asymmetric vulnerabilities. 

Exploiting the Cyberspace Arena 

If the case for proceeding with timely initiatives to ensure the continued enabling 

functions of the Nation's space-based assets sounds reasonable enough in principle, then 

the argument for pursuing similar measures by way of vouchsafing our continued 
freedom of movement in cyberspace can be said to be downright compelling. The latter 

arena, far more than today's military space environment, is one in which the Nation faces 

clear and present threats that could be completely debilitating when it comes to 

conducting effective military operations. Not only that, opponents who would exploit 

opportunities in cyberspace with hostile intent have every possibility for adversely 

affecting the very livelihood of the Nation, since that arena has increasingly become not 

just the global connective tissue, but also the Nation's central nervous system and center 

of gravity. 

Just a few generations ago, any American loss of unimpeded access to cyberspace would 

have been mainly an inconvenience. Today, however, given the Nation's ever-expanding 

dependence on that medium, the isolation, corruption, or elimination of electrical power 

supply, financial transactions,key communications links,and other essential Web-based 

functions could bring life as we know it to a halt. Furthermore, given the unprecedented 

reliance of the United States today on computers and the Internet, cyberspace has 

arguably become the Nation's center of gravity not just for military operations, but for all 

aspects of national activity, to include economic, financial, diplomatic, and other 

transactions. Our heightened vulnerability in this arena stems from the fact that we have 

moved beyond the era of physical information and financial exchanges through paper and 

hard currency and rely instead on the movement of digital representations of information 

and wealth. By one informed account, more than 90 percent of American business in all 

sectors, to say nothing of key institutions of governance and national defense, connects 

and conducts essential communications within the cyberspace arena.7 Accordingly, that 

arena has become an American Achilles heel to a greater extent than any of our current 

opponents. 

The term cyberspace derives from the Greek word kubernetes, or "steersman." Reduced 

to basics, it is the proverbial ether within and through which electromagnetic radiation is 

propagated in connection with the operation and control of mechanical and electronic 

transmission systems. Properly understood, cyberspace is not a "mission," but rather an 

operating domain just like the atmosphere and space, and it embraces all systems that 

incorporate software as a key element. It is a medium, moreover, in which information 

can be created and acted on at any time, anywhere, and by essentially anyone. It is 

qualitatively different from the land, sea, air, and space domains, yet it both overlaps and 

continuously operates within all four. It also is the only domain in which all instruments 

of national power (diplomatic, informational, military, and economic) can be 

concurrently exercised through the manipulation of data and gateways. Cyberspace can 

be thought of as a "digital commons" analogous to the more familiar maritime, aerial, and 

exoatmospheric commons. Moreover, just like the other three commons, it is one in 

which our continued uninhibited access can never be taken for granted as a natural and 

assured right. Yet uniquely among the other three, it is a domain in which the classic 

constraints of distance, space, time, and investment are reduced, in some cases 

dramatically, both for ourselves and for potential enemies. 

There is nothing new in principle about cyberspace as a military operating domain. On 

the contrary, it has existed for as long as radio frequency emanations have been a routine 
part of military operations. As far back as the late 1970s, the commander in chief of the 

Soviet Navy, Admiral Sergei Gorshkov, declared famously that "the next war will be won 

by the country that is able to exploit the electromagnetic spectrum to the fullest."8 

Furthermore, the Soviets for decades expounded repeatedly, and with considerable 

sophistication and seriousness, on a mission area that they referred to as REB (for 

radioelektronaya bor'ba, or radio-electronic combat). However, only more recently has it 

been explicitly recognized as an operating arena on a par with the atmosphere and space 

and begun to be systematically explored as a medium of combat in and of itself. 

At present, theorizing about airpower and its uses and limitations has the most deeply 

rooted tradition in the United States, with conceptualizing about military space occupying 

second place in that regard. In contrast, focused thinking about operations in cyberspace 

remains in its infancy. Yet cyberspace-related threats to American interests are currently 

at hand to a degree that potentially catastrophic air and space threats are not—at least yet. 

Accordingly, the U.S. defense establishment should have every incentive to get serious 

about this domain now, when new terrorist, fourth-generation warfare, and information 

operations challengers have increasingly moved to the forefront alongside traditional 

peer-adversary threats.9 

In light of that emergent reality, it is essential to include cyberspace in any consideration 

of air and space capabilities. Like the air and space domains, cyberspace is part and 

parcel of the third dimension (the first two being the land and maritime environments). 

Also like those other two domains, it is a setting in which organized attacks on critical 

infrastructure and other targets of interest can be conducted from a distance, on a wide 

variety of "fronts," and on a global scale—except in this case, at the speed of light. 

Moreover, it is the principal domain in which the Nation's air services exercise their 

command, control, communications, and ISR capabilities that enable global mobility and 

rapid long-range strike. 

In thinking about cyberspace as a military operating arena, a number of the medium's 

distinguishing characteristics are worth noting. First and foremost, control of cyberspace 

is a sine qua non for operating effectively in the other two domains. Were unimpeded 

access to the electromagnetic spectrum denied to us through hostile actions, satelliteaided munitions would become useless, command and control mechanisms would be 

disrupted, and the ensuing effects could be paralyzing. Accordingly, cyberspace has 

become an emergent theater of operations that will almost surely be contested in any 

future fight. Successful exploitation of this domain through network warfare operations 

can allow an opponent to dominate or hold at risk any or all of the global commons. For 

that reason, not only American superiority but also American dominance must be 

assured. 

One reason for the imminent and broad-based nature of the cyberspace challenge is the 

low buy-in cost compared to the vastly more complex and expensive appurtenances of air 

and space warfare, along with the growing ability of present and prospective Lilliputian 

adversaries to generate what one expert called "catastrophic cascading effects" through 

asymmetric operations against the American Gulliver.10 Because the price of entry is 
fairly minimal compared to the massive investments that would be required for any 

competitor to prevail in the air and space domains, the cyberspace warfare arena naturally 

favors the offense. It does so, moreover, not only for us, but also for any opponents who 

might use the medium for conducting organized attacks on critical nodes of the Nation's 

infrastructure. Such attacks can be conducted both instantaneously and from a safe haven 

anywhere in the world, with every possibility of achieving high impact and a low 

likelihood of attribution and, accordingly, of timely and effective U.S. retribution. 

Indeed, America's vulnerabilities in cyberspace are open to the entire world and are 

accessible by anyone with the wherewithal and determination to exploit them. Without 

appropriate defensive firewalls and countermeasures in place, anything we might do to 

exploit cyberspace can be done to us as well, and relatively inexpensively. Worse yet, 

threat trends and possibilities in the cyberspace domain put in immediate jeopardy much, 

if not all, of what the Nation has accomplished in the other two domains in recent 

decades. Our continued prevalence in cyberspace can help ensure our prevalence in 

combat operations both within and beyond the atmosphere, which, in turn, will enable our 

prevalence in overall joint and combined battlespace. On the other side of the coin, any 

loss of cyberspace dominance on our part can negate our most cherished gains in air and 

space in virtually an instant. Technologies that can enable offensive cyberspace 

operations, moreover, are evolving not only within the most well-endowed military 

establishments around the world, but also even more so in the various innovative 

activities now under way in other government, private sector, and academic settings. The 

United States commands no natural advantage in this domain, and its leaders cannot 

assume that the next breakthrough will always be ours. All of this has rendered offensive 

cyberspace operations an attractive asymmetric option not only for mainstream opponents 

and other potential exploiters of the medium in ways inimical to the Nation's interests, 

but also for state and nonstate rogue actors with sufficient resources to cause us real 

harm. 

Moreover, unlike the air and space environments, cyberspace is the only military 

operating area in which the United States already has peer competitors in place and hard 

at work. As for specific challengers, U.S. officials have recently suggested that the most 

sophisticated threat may come from China, which unquestionably is already a peer 

competitor with ample financial resources and technological expertise. There is more 

than tangential evidence to suggest that cyberwar specialists in China's People's 

Liberation Army have already focused hostile efforts against nonsecure U.S.

transmissions.11 Such evidence bears strong witness to the fact that state-sponsored 

cyberspace intrusion is now an established fact and that accurate and timely attack 

characterization has come to present a major challenge. 

In light of its relative newness as a recognized and well-understood medium of combat, 

detailed and validated concepts of operations for offensive and defensive counter–cyber 

warfare and cyberspace interdiction have most likely yet to be worked out and formally 

incorporated into the Nation's combat repertoire. Interestingly, some of the most 

promising initial tactical insights toward that end may come from accessible sources in 

the nonmilitary domain, including from the business world, the intelligence world, the 
high-end amateur hacker world, and even perhaps segments of the underworld that have 

already pioneered the malicious exploitation of cyberspace. Ultimately, such efforts can 

help inform the development of a full-fledged theory of cyberspace power, which, at 

bottom, "is about dominating the electromagnetic spectrum—from wired and unwired 

networks to radio waves, microwaves, infrared, x-rays, and directed energy."12 

With a full-court press of creative thought toward the development of new capabilities, 

the possibility of what a future cyberspace weapons array might include is almost 

limitless. Cyber weapons can be both surgical and mass-based in their intended effects, 

ranging from what one Air Force cyber warrior recently portrayed as "the ultimate 

precision weapon—the electron," all the way to measures aimed at causing mass 

disruption and full system breakdowns by means of both enabling and direct attacks.13 

The first and most important step toward dealing effectively with the cyberspace warfare 

challenge in both threat categories will be erecting impenetrable firewalls for ourselves 

and taking down those of the enemy. Of course, with respect to plausible techniques and 

procedures for tomorrow's cyberspace world, it will be essential never to lose sight of the 

timeless rule among airmen that a tactic tried twice is no longer a tactic but a procedure. 

As the newly emerging cyberspace warfare community increasingly sets its sights on 

such goals, it would do well to consider taking a page from the recent experience of the 

military space community in charting next steps by way of organizational and 

implementation measures. For example, just as the military space community eventually 

emulated to good effect many conventions of the air warfare community, so might the 

cyberspace community usefully study the proven best practices of the space community 

in gaining increased relevance in the joint warfare world. Some possible first steps 

toward that end might include a systematic stocktaking of the Nation's cyberspace 

warfare posture, with a view toward identifying gaps, shortfalls, and redundancies in 

existing offensive and defensive capabilities. 

Similarly, those now tasked with developing and validating cyberspace concepts of 

operations might find great value in reflecting on the many parallels between space and 

cyberspace as domains of offensive and defensive activity. For example, both domains, at 

least today, are principally about collecting and transmitting information. Both play 

pivotal roles in enabling and facilitating lethal combat operations by other force elements. 

Both, again at least today, have more to do with the pursuit of functional effects than with 

the physical destruction of enemy equities, even though both can materially aid in the 

accomplishment of the latter. Moreover, in both domains, operations are conducted 

remotely by warfighters sitting before consoles and keyboards, not only outside the 

medium itself, but also in almost every case out of harm's way. Both domains are global 

rather than regional in their breadth of coverage and operational impact. And both 

domains overlap—for example, the jamming of a GPS signal to a satellite-aided munition 

guiding to a target is both a counterspace and a cyberwar operation insofar as the desired 

effect is sought simultaneously in both combat arenas.14 To that extent, it seems 

reasonable to suggest that at least some tactics, techniques, procedures, and rules of 

thumb that have been found useful by military space professionals might also offer 
promising points of departure from which to explore comparable ways of exploiting the 

cyberspace medium. 

Finally, as cyberspace professionals become more conversant with the operational 

imperatives of joint warfighting, they also will have a collective obligation to rise above 

the fragmented subcultures that unfortunately still persist within their own community 

and become a more coherent and interconnected center of cyberspace excellence able to 

speak credibly about what the exploitation of that medium brings to joint force 

employment. Moreover, cyberspace warfare professionals will need to learn and accept 

as gospel that any "cyberspace culture" that may ultimately emerge from such efforts 

must not be isolated from mainstream combat forces in all Services, as the Air Force's 

space sector was when it was in the clutches of the systems and acquisition communities, 

but instead must be rooted from the start in an unerring focus on the art and conduct of 

war. 

Toward a Cross-domain Synthesis 

As long as military space activity remains limited to enabling rather than actually 

conducting combat operations, as will continue to be the case for at least the near-term 

future, it will arguably remain premature even to think of the notion of space "power," 

strictly speaking, let alone suggest that the time has come to begin crafting a self-standing 

theory of spacepower comparable in ambitiousness and scope to the competing (and stillevolving) theories of land-, sea-, and airpower that were developed over the course of the 

20th century. Only when desired operational effects can be achieved by means of 

imposition options exercised directly through and from space to space-based, airbreathing, and terrestrial targets of interest (or, more to the point, when we can directly 

inflict harm on our adversaries from space) will it become defensible to entertain 

thoughts about space "power" as a fact of life rather than as merely a prospective and 

desirable goal. 

To be sure, it scarcely follows from this observation that today's space professionals have 

no choice but to wait patiently for the day when they become force appliers on a par with 

their air, land, and maritime power contemporaries before they can legitimately claim that 

they are true warfighters. On the contrary, the Nation's space capabilities have long since 

matured to a point where they have become just as important a contributor to the overall 

national power equation as has what one might call mobility power, information power, 

and all other such adjuncts of the Nation's military strength that are indispensable to joint 

force commanders for achieving desired effects at all levels of warfare. To that extent, 

insisting that it remains premature to speak of spacepower solely because our space assets 

cannot yet deliver such combat effects directly may, in the end, be little more than an 

exercise in word play when one considers what space already has done toward 

transforming the Nation's airpower into something vastly more capable than it ever was 

before U.S. on-orbit equities had attained their current breadth of enabling potential. 

Until the day comes when military space activity is more than "merely" about enabling 

terrestrial combat operations, however, a more useful exercise in theory-building in the 
service of combat operators at all levels might be to move beyond the air-power 

theorizing that has taken place to date in pursuit of something akin to a working "unified 

field theory" that explicates the connections, interactions, and overlaps among the air, 

space, and cyberspace domains in quest of synergies between and among them in the 

interest of achieving a joint force commander's objectives more efficiently and 

effectively. A major pitfall to be avoided in this regard is the pursuit of separate theory 

sets for each medium. To borrow from Clausewitz on this point, space, like the earth's 

atmosphere and the electromagnetic spectrum, may have its own grammar, but it does not 

have its own logic. Each of the three environments explored in the preceding pages has 

distinctive physical features and operating rules that demand respect. By one 

characterization in this regard, "air permits freedom of movement not possible on land or 

sea. . . . Space yields an overarching capability to view globally and attack with precision 

from the orbital perspective. Cyberspace provides the capability to conduct combat on a 

global scale simultaneously on a virtually infinite number of 'fronts.'"15 Yet while the air, 

space, and cyberspace mediums are all separate and unique physical environments, taken 

together, they present a common warfighting challenge in that operations in each are 

mutually supportive of those in the other two. For example, the pursuit of air supremacy 

does not simply entail combat operations in the atmosphere, but also hinges critically on 

ISR functions and on GPS targeting from both air-breathing and space-based platforms 

that transmit through cyberspace. 

Another pitfall from the earliest days of airpower theorizing to be avoided is that of 

overreaching with respect to promises and expectations of what any ensuing theory 

should encompass and seek to make possible. Since airpower, spacepower, cyberpower, 

or any combination thereof can be everything from totally decisive to only marginally 

relevant to a commander's needs at any given moment, any insistence that these 

dimensions of military power be the centerpieces of overall national strategy will almost 

certainly fail to resonate and take lasting root in the joint arena. The single greatest failure 

of airpower's most revered founts of presumed insight and foresight, Generals Giulio 

Douhet and Billy Mitchell, was their passionate espousal not simply of a theory of 

airpower, but an overarching theory of war that hinged everything on the air weapon to 

the virtual exclusion of all other instruments of military power. As retired Air Vice 

Marshal Tony Mason of Great Britain's Royal Air Force insightfully noted in this regard, 

any truly effective theory of airpower (and, by the same token, of spacepower and 

cyberpower) must endeavor to emphasize not just the unique characteristics of the 

instrument, but also "the features it shares, to a greater or lesser degree, with other forms 

of warfare." Mason added that the preeminence of the instrument "will stand or fall not 

by promises and abstract theories, but, like any other kind of military power, by its 

relevance to, and ability to secure, political objectives at a cost acceptable to the 

government of the day."16 

In light of the foregoing, the most immediate task for those seeking to build a better 

theory for leveraging capabilities in the third dimension may be to develop a point of 

departure for thinking systematically and holistically about synergies and best uses of the 

Nation's capabilities and prospects in all three domains, since all are key to the Nation's 

transforming joint strike warfare repertoire. Furthermore, it would be helpful to have a 
seamless body of applied and actionable theory that encompasses all three domains and 

that focuses more on functions and effects than on the physical locations of the 

instruments of power, with a view toward rank-ordering the many priorities in each and 

across all three, with the goal of charting a course for achieving cross-domain dominance. 

Another useful step toward managing the existing seams between and among the air, 

space, and cyberspace communities within the American defense establishment would be 

a perspective focused on operational integration accompanied by organizational 

differentiation. Through such a bifurcated approach, each medium can be harnessed to 

serve the needs of all components in the joint arena while, at the same time, being treated 

rightly as its own domain when it comes to program and infrastructure management, 

funding, cadre building, and career development.17 Such organizational differentiation 

will be essential for the orderly growth of core competencies, discrete career fields, and 

mature professionalism in each medium. However, operational integration should be the 

abiding concern and goal for all three mediums, since it is only from synergies among the 

three that each can work to its best and highest use. 

This is not a call for the Air Force, as the Nation's main repository of air, space, and 

cyberspace warfare capabilities today, to make the same mistake in a new guise that it 

made in 1959 when it conjured up the false artifice of "aerospace" to suggest that the air 

and space mediums were somehow undifferentiated just because they happened to be 

coextensive. Nothing could be further from the truth. It is, rather, to spotlight the unifying 

purpose of operations in all three mediums working in harmony, namely, to deliver 

desired combat effects in, through, and from the third dimension as quickly as possible 

and at the least possible cost in friendly lives lost and unintended damage incurred. Only 

after that crucial transitional stage of conceptualization has passed and when military 

space operations have come into their own as an independent producer, rather than just an 

enabler, of combat effects will it be possible to start giving serious thought to coming to 

grips with the prerequisites for a self-standing theory of spacepower.

Notes

1. For an overview of the Air Force's pivotal contribution to this transformation, see Benjamin S. 

Lambeth, "The Air Force Renaissance," in The Air Force, ed. General James P. McCarthy, USAF 

(Ret.), and Colonel Drue L. DeBerry, USAF (Ret.) (Andrews Air Force Base, MD: The Air Force 

Historical Foundation, 2002), 190–217. A fuller assessment of post-Vietnam developments in 

fixed-wing air warfare capability in all of the Services may be found in Benjamin S. Lambeth, The 

Transformation of American Airpower (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 2000). 

2. These major air operations are examined in detail in Benjamin S. Lambeth, NATO's Air War for 

Kosovo: A Strategic and Operational Assessment (Santa Monica, CA: RAND Corporation, 2001); 

Airpower Against Terror: America's Conduct of Operation Enduring Freedom (Santa Monica, 

CA: RAND Corporation, 2005); and The Unseen War: Airpower's Role in the Takedown of 

Saddam Hussein (Santa Monica, CA: RAND Corporation, forthcoming). 

3. For more on this point, see Benjamin S. Lambeth, American Carrier Airpower at the Dawn of a 

New Century (Santa Monica, CA: RAND Corporation, 2005). 

4. Of course, space plays a larger role in the "fixing" of targets than just providing space-based ISR. 

Space-based communications and the Global Positioning System are both essential enablers of 
unmanned aerial vehicle operations, which are also a critical contributor to the "fix, find, track, 

target, engage, assess" equation. 

5. Cited in E.C. Aldridge, Jr., "Thoughts on the Management of National Security Space Activities of 

the Department of Defense," unpublished paper, July 6, 2000, 3. 

6. For the essential known details of the test, see Craig Covault, "Space Control: Chinese Antisatellite Weapon Test Will Intensify Funding and Global Policy Debate on the Military Uses of 

Space," Aviation Week and Space Technology, January 22, 2007, 24–25. 

7. General James Cartwright, USMC, Commander, U.S. Strategic Command, remarks at the Air 

Force Association's Warfare Symposium, Orlando, Florida, February 8, 2007. 

8. Admiral of the Fleet Sergei G. Gorshkov, The Sea Power of the State (Annapolis, MD: Naval 

Institute Press, 1979). 

9. Among the classic articles in the airpower theory literature are Edward Warner, "Douhet, Mitchell, 

Seversky: Theories of Air Warfare," in Makers of Modern Strategy, ed. Edward Mead Earle 

(Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1943), and David MacIsaac, "Voices from the Central 

Blue: The Airpower Theorists," in Makers of Modern Strategy: From Machiavelli to the Nuclear 

Age, ed. Peter Paret (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1986). See also the collection of 

essays in Phillip S. Meilinger, ed., The Paths of Heaven: The Evolution of Airpower Theory 

(Maxwell Air Force Base, AL: Air University Press, 1997). One of the better synopses of 

spacepower thinking to date is presented in Peter L. Hays et al., Spacepower for a New 

Millennium: Space and U.S. National Security (New York: McGraw Hill, 2000). For the most 

serious and thorough treatise thus far to have expounded about the cyberspace domain, its 

boundaries, and its potential, see George J. Rattray, Strategic Warfare in Cyberspace (Cambridge: 

MIT Press, 2001). The book is the doctoral dissertation of an Air Force lieutenant colonel who 

commanded the 23d Information Operations Squadron in the Air Force Information Warfare 

Center. 

10. Colonel Glenn Zimmerman, USAF, "The United States Air Force and Cyberspace: Ultimate 

Warfighting Domain and the USAF's Destiny," unpublished paper. 

11. See Carlo Munoz, "Air Force Official Sees China as Biggest U.S. Threat in Cyberspace," Inside 

the Air Force, November 17, 2006. 

12. "Ten Propositions Regarding Cyber Power," Air Force Cyberspace Task Force, unpublished 

briefing chart, no date. 

13. Zimmerman. 

14. I am grateful to my RAND colleague Karl Mueller for suggesting these and other thoughtprovoking parallels between the two media. 

15. Zimmerman. 

16. Air Vice Marshal Tony Mason, RAF (Ret.), Airpower: A Centennial Appraisal (London: 

Brassey's, 1994), 273–274. 

17. For an earlier development of this line of argument with respect to the Air Force's space 

community, see Benjamin S. Lambeth, Mastering the Ultimate High Ground: Next Steps in the 

Military Uses of Space (Santa Monica, CA: RAND Corporation, 2003). Part III: Civil, 

Commercial, and Economic Space Perspectives 
Chapter 17:

Security and Spacepower

M.V. Smith

Spacepower provides different ways to manage security concerns. Because of its 

matchless ability to gain global access and achieve global presence while delivering 

nearly ubiquitous capabilities, spacepower is playing an increasing security role in war 

and peace around the globe on a perpetual basis. This chapter examines the opportunities 

spacepower provides to secure the peace and to fight wars. 

Spacepower and War Prevention 

Spacepower is ideally suited for war prevention—securing the peace—as a matter of dayto-day statecraft. To put this in clearer terms, "the primary value of spacepower is not

support to warfighters, rather it is that space capabilities are the primary means of war 

prevention."1 Spacepower can provide both indirect and direct methods to achieve war 

prevention. Indirect methods involve cooperative interstate behavior to reduce security 

concerns without the use or threat of force. Direct methods involve the use of force or 

threats of force. For now, spacepower lends itself more toward indirect methods such as 

providing global and cislunar transparency and expanding broad international 

partnerships. Direct methods are more hard-power–centric and include those capabilities 

that deliver assurance, dissuasive, and deterrent effects, matched with careful diplomacy, 

in a cost/benefit calculus. As space weapons proliferate, spacepower will offer effective 

direct methods of preventing war. Each indirect and direct method is discussed below.

Indirect Methods 

Transparency. Space-based reconnaissance and surveillance platforms, because of their 

global nature, contribute directly to reducing security concerns by providing insight into 

observable human activities around the globe and in the cislunar region. Insight into 

human activity in space, manned or unmanned, is every bit as important as observations 

of terrestrial activities. When considered together, such insights can alleviate unfounded 

fears and prevent miscalculations, as well as deliver warnings and indications of activities 

of genuine concern. This was obvious right from the start of the space age during the 

Cold War when the first successful American reconnaissance satellite, called Corona 

XIV, returned more imagery of Soviet nuclear forces from deep inside the Soviet Union 

than did all of the prior U–2 missions combined.2 This new satellite-derived information 

caused a sharp downward revision in the estimate of Soviet intercontinental ballistic 

missile launchers from 140–200 to between 10 and 25.3 Later, only six of the sites were 

determined to be operational.4 This application of spacepower helped reduce the 

American security concern and allowed the Eisenhower and subsequent administrations 

to right-size their nuclear deterrent force against a much smaller threat than suggested by 
estimates formulated without satellite data. Space was no longer merely a science project, 

but a real instrument of policy. True spacepower had arrived. 

As the example above illustrates, spacepower provides transparency that reduces the fog

during peacetime, increases the certainty of information, and allows contemplation of 

matters with a better approximation of the facts.5 While this is entirely beneficial to the 

actor who possesses such information, the value of transparency has its limits. Some 

states feel increased security concerns if satellite-derived information about their 

observable affairs is distributed widely. China voiced this complaint shortly after the 

release of Google Earth, but accommodations were made to degrade the quality of images 

of areas sensitive to the Chinese government.6 Such concerns must be addressed and dealt 

with directly, but accommodations can be made. Many states undoubtedly will change 

their conduct of military and other affairs to ways that are not observable by satellites. 

India, for example, avoided detection of its efforts to develop and test a nuclear device in 

1998 by conducting activities when U.S. imagery satellites were not passing overhead 

and during times when sandstorms and intense heat could disrupt surveillance sensors.7

Such nefarious workarounds can be eliminated by fielding a large constellation of several 

dozen reconnaissance and surveillance satellites owned and operated by suprastate or 

trans-state actors using multispectral technology. The point is that every inch of the Earth

could be imaged several times a day using various techniques that can counter various 

many concealment efforts. Global transparency efforts are large and expensive and by 

their very nature will require a high degree of international partnering.

Partnering. Another opportunity that spacepower provides for managing security 

concerns is capitalizing on collaborative international security space arrangements to 

provide global transparency, space situational awareness, and space traffic management, 

to name just a few. Such partnerships need not be limited to security-related functions, 

but must cross into civil and commercial endeavors as well, such as space-based solar 

power, human missions to the Moon and Mars, space stations, space-based astronomy, 

and so forth. The goal is not only to accomplish something meaningful in space, but also 

to build mutual understanding and rapport among the participating states. 

The American and Soviet joint venture on the Apollo-Soyuz mission in the mid-1970s is 

one such example. Although the tangible scientific benefits of the exercise are debatable, 

it demonstrated to both parties and to the international community that cooperation on a 

very challenging task is possible, even between the two Cold War antagonists with their 

widely divergent strategic cultures. This civil spacepower effort became a point of 

departure for other confidence-building gestures between the two and certainly eased 

tensions in the homelands and among the rest of the world as well, thereby reducing 

security concerns.

Partnering on spacefaring projects brings together more brilliant minds and resources to 

solve problems and to advance the art. It not only heightens the likelihood of success of 

those programs, but over time it also reduces the friction during peacetime between 

states, decreases the potential for cultural misunderstandings, increases the opportunities 
for alliance, integrates aspects of each state's economic and industrial base, and fosters 

working relationships between governments.8

Partnering is not always easy, as the members of the International Space Station or the 

mostly European states belonging to the Galileo Consortium will attest. In fact, it can be 

frustrating and even maddening. Disparate economic strengths, distribution of resources, 

and talent give each state a different value as a potential partner. States that are rich in 

some areas will be highly sought after as partners. Poorer states will not. However, from 

a partnership perspective, all are valuable as prospective partners as part of a 

collaborative international security arrangement.

The opportunities that spacepower offers spacefaring and non-spacefaring states alike in 

the forms of global transparency and international partnering in order to prevent wars are 

entirely different from opportunities provided by operations in any other media. The 

strategic cultures of most states—especially weaker or developing ones that are not yet 

spacefaring—will find the indirect methods highly attractive and engender soft power to 

the leaders of such efforts.9 These approaches may be sufficient for most states' spacerelated security needs while reducing their security concerns inside the terrestrial 

confines. 

Direct Methods 

Many states will not feel comfortable having their security rest on such idealistic 

constructs as the indirect methods alone. Some states, especially those with more 

militaristic strategic cultures, will likely seek space weaponry (overtly or covertly) in the 

form of defensive systems to protect their space assets from attack and offensive systems 

to prevent foes from exploiting space to gain a military advantage. 

The focus here is on hard power and space weapons—weapons that create their effects in 

space against the space segment, regardless of where the weapons themselves are based. 

We will not be looking at spacepower's longstanding support to terrestrial forces that are 

continuously engaged in dissuasion and deterrence strategies. This is particularly the case 

with nuclear forces but is increasingly so with conventional forces as well. 

Many factors contribute to space-related security concerns faced by states and directly 

correlate to their likely drive for space weaponry. Each state will perform its own threatrisk calculus and respond accordingly. There are some elements of the threat-risk 

calculus that must be kept in mind. For example, more advanced spacefaring states have 

the most at risk in space and therefore have greater incentives to field defensive 

weaponry. Less advanced states may build offensive weapons as an asymmetric means of 

countering the power of a space-reliant potential adversary. The proliferation of space 

weapons will drive the need for greater space defenses. The lack of sufficient space 

situational awareness for threat and damage assessment and attribution increases the 

sense of risk by all. Finally, every state, whether it is directly spacefaring or not, is a user 

of space services, and therefore all states are space actors and must consider their space 

threat-risk calculus.
Acquiring weapons is not a sufficient precursor to war, as the peaceful conclusion of the 

Cold War illustrates. In fact, the possession of hard power capabilities managed in a 

responsible and constrained manner enables the war preventive strategies of assurance, 

dissuasion, and deterrence, as were used to avert hostilities during the Cold War and 

beyond. There is an important point that must be made here. States can only practice 

assurance, dissuasion, and deterrence if they openly possess a credible force of space 

weapons.10 There is no war prevention benefit gained by keeping space weapons a secret, 

other than avoiding a space arms race. A potential adversary must clearly perceive a 

credible space weapons capability for these strategies to work. There are no agreed 

definitions for these terms, so care will be given to explain exactly what is meant.

Assurances. The concept of assurances is borrowed directly from nuclear-related 

literature. It involves stronger and weaker states making guarantees (assurances) for the 

purpose of preventing proliferation of weapons of mass destruction and war. There are 

negative and positive security assurances. These concepts can be related to space 

weapons and warfare. Negative assurances would be guarantees by space weapons states 

not to use or threaten the use of such weapons against states that have formally renounced 

space weapons. Positive assurances would be the agreement between a space weapons 

state and a non–space weapons state that the latter would receive assistance if it is 

attacked or threatened by a state that uses space weapons against them.11

Presently, there are no known assurances between space weapons states and non–space 

weapons states in the international community beyond those in the Outer Space Treaty. 

This is a wide open area waiting for diplomatic engagement. Presumably, the threat 

posed by space weapons has not yet raised the level of security concerns among the 

international community to stimulate assurance-making among states.

As we have seen in the nuclear community, some states will give public assurances not to 

proliferate, only to work to acquire weapons covertly. There is always the risk of being 

hoodwinked, which highlights the need for greater transparency and other soft power–

related means of securing the aims of policy. In addition, no state has yet come forward 

and declared itself a "space weapons state," even though we see evidence of testing and 

actual employment of such weapons with increasing frequency. The utility of space 

weapons–related assurances are questionable until it is clear who has space weapons and 

who does not.

Dissuasion. Dissuasion, like soft power, rests on the ability to shape the preferences of 

others so they behave in a certain desired manner.12 But unlike soft power, where others 

choose a course of action you would like them to pursue simply because they find it 

attractive, dissuasion is really about persuading them not to do something that you would 

not like them to do. Dissuasion is a negotiation of sorts, where one party "talks" the other

out of doing something by demonstrating to them that the costs outweigh the benefits, 

because the competition is so far ahead that it becomes either impossible or simply 

impractical to catch up. 
Dissuasion is a method attempted by powerful, long-established nuclear states to 

persuade nonnuclear states from proliferating. They approach states before they 

proliferate and directly or tacitly attempt to dissuade them from proceeding with their 

program by convincing them that the cost of competing with the powerful established 

proliferator in the nuclear arena is just too great. The hope is for the state to decide on its 

own that joining in the nuclear competition is not in its interest. 

As applied to spacepower, a state that demonstrates a robust defensive and offensive 

capability may tacitly dissuade others from attempting to compete against that state in 

space.13 Conversely, if a state's overall power, especially military power, appears directly 

tied to its space-based assets—a center of gravity—but it has no visible means for 

defending them or denying other states from exploiting space for military gain, it almost 

baits potential adversaries into fielding space weaponry. 

The evidence shows mixed results with dissuasion with regard to nuclear proliferation. 

Since the mid-1990s, India, Pakistan, and North Korea have acquired nuclear devices, 

and Iran may be well on its way. Libya may be a success story. Its leadership seems to 

have made a cost-benefit analysis that resulted in the shutdown of its nuclear program. 

Other states may have been dissuaded, but the evidence is not clear. 

There is an important note to add regarding spacepower. A state that has overwhelming 

spacepower may successfully dissuade another actor from competing militarily in the 

space arena, but that actor might choose to pursue asymmetric and potentially more 

violent means of achieving its aims as a result.

Deterrence. When soft power, assurances, and dissuasion fail, spacepower plays a central 

role in deterrent strategies that may prevent wars. Deterrence is the prevention of war 

based on coercion by threat of damage.14 It must be a credible threat of inflicting 

unacceptable damage on an opponent. This was the case during the Cold War standoff 

between the United States and Soviet Union. 

During the arms race of the Cold War, U.S. and Soviet space systems became thoroughly 

integrated into their states' nuclear attack warning, command and control, assessment, 

targeting, planning, and most every aspect of finding, targeting, and potentially 

destroying each other. The end of the Cold War and the commensurate reduction of 

security concerns that followed allowed the focus of space systems to evolve rapidly 

away from purely support to nuclear forces toward support to all warfighting activities, 

conventional, covert, and otherwise. It remains clear, however, that spacepower assets, as 

deeply integrated as they are in all aspects of military operations among advanced 

spacefaring states, will continue to be the interconnecting glue making terrestrial 

deterrence more effective.

It may be possible to deter an advanced spacefaring adversary who is heavily reliant on 

space systems but who has taken few or no precautions to defend them. In this case, 

possessing a credible set of offensive space weapons may threaten the adversary into 
avoiding confrontation. Sensing this, the adversary may initiate a crash program to 

acquire defensive capabilities or space weapons of its own.

Unfortunately, deterrence is based on an abstraction where there is no limit to the 

extreme of violence that can be threatened in retaliation. As Clausewitz noted, "Each 

side, therefore, compels its opponent to follow suit; a reciprocal action is started which 

must lead, in theory, to extremes."15 This tendency can easily lead to arms racing.

Assurances are faith-based at best. Meanwhile, dissuasion and deterrence come with very 

real risks. Both presuppose that both sides of a potential confrontation are equally 

rational, have equal understanding of the stakes, and are using the same rational calculus 

to establish policy in an interactive fashion.16 Given the differences in the strategic 

cultures of the players involved, these presumptions can never be the case in reality. As a 

result, there are margins of error associated with every calculation. A state that overtly 

builds offensive space weapons for the purpose of enabling dissuasive and deterrent 

strategies for war prevention may be misunderstood as having hostile intentions that 

trigger security concerns across the globe. The same is true for a state that may build 

what it considers to be a defensive system but that has an apparent dual application as an 

offensive system. China's test of a direct ascent antisatellite weapon in January 2007 may 

be a case in point.17 A state may do its best to tailor its forces to support dissuasive and 

deterrent strategies and focus them at whatever it suspects the enemy holds dear, only to 

discover that the enemy reacts quite differently than expected. There are no guarantees.18

A way to reduce the margins of error and the risk associated with direct hard power war 

prevention strategies is to include them within the policy-driven context of both indirect 

strategies suggested above: within the framework of global transparency and within 

broad international partnerships.

Spacepower and Warfare 

We have arrived at what will undoubtedly be the most controversial part of this chapter, 

wherein we discuss spacepower and its nexus with warfare. It is controversial only 

because space has yet to be overtly weaponized or generally recognized as an arena of 

open combat. Many, if not most, want to keep it a weapons-free peaceful sanctuary, 

particularly the suprastate actors. Just because all other media are weaponized and used 

as arenas of combat does not mean that space will automatically follow suit.19 Perhaps 

this generation will figure out how to keep the beast of war in chains short enough to 

prevent it from going to space. But the next (and each succeeding) generation must also 

keep the chains short. Unfortunately, the constant march of technology is making space 

more important to states at the same time it is making it easier to build space weapons.

In anticipating the future of spacepower for theoretical discussion, we can do little more 

than extract a roadmap from the history of human activity and extrapolate forward. The 

preponderance of evidence suggests that space will be no different than air, land, and sea 

regarding warfare. In the words of Colin Gray:
It is a rule in strategy, one derived empirically from the evidence of two 

and a half millennia, that anything of great strategic importance to one 

belligerent, for that reason has to be worth attacking by others. And the 

greater the importance, the greater has to be the incentive to damage, 

disable, capture, or destroy it. In the bluntest of statements: space warfare 

is a certainty in the future because the use of space in war has become 

vital. . . . Regardless of public sentimental or environmentally shaped 

attitudes towards space as the pristine final frontier, space warfare is 

coming.20

The strategic value of space to states is not in question. Advanced spacefaring states are 

already reliant—and moving toward dependence—on space-derived services for 

activities across every sector of their societies. Spacepower is becoming critical to their 

styles of warfighting. Likewise, the injury that can be caused to such states by menacing 

their space systems can be considerable. Given these incentives, the beast of war will 

either break its chains all at once or stretch them slowly over time.21

Like war itself, space warfare, the decision to build space weapons, and whether or not to 

weaponize space are all matters of policy, not theory.22 It is the job of theory to anticipate 

such developments given the template that history suggests. Land, air-, and seapower 

lend imperfect analogies to spacepower, but they are applicable enough to see that 

spacepower may have its own grammar, but not its own logic.23 The logic of statecraft 

and warfare laid out in Sun Tzu's The Art of War and in Carl von Clausewitz' On War

applies to spacepower as well as any other element of military power. A student of 

spacepower must become thoroughly familiar with both of these works.24 War is a 

political activity and therefore a human activity with a long history that serves as a guide 

path. Spacepower is already part of the warfighting mix in the political and strategic unity 

of war, and this trend will continue.25 Some predict that spacepower will make the 

greatest contributions to combat effectiveness in wars of the 21st century.26

War Extended to Space 

War is an instrument of policy, and spacepower, as an element of the military instrument 

of power, is part of the policy mix that makes war, whatever form it may take.27 Space 

generally has been treated as a sanctuary since the Eisenhower administration, and the 

use of space systems in warfare is limited to supporting terrestrial forces. This is not 

likely to change if the security concerns of states remain low. However, if states are 

confronted with intense security concerns, such as their survival, the weaponization of 

space and its use as an arena of conflict becomes far more likely. 

Spacepower is a player at every point along the spectrum of conflict.28 Covert operations 

often use space services with the same degree of reliance as the large joint military forces 

of advanced spacefaring states engaged in a conflict. In addition, space systems often 

support multiple military operations with varying intensities in different parts of the 

world simultaneously. 
Spacefaring prowess is a common attribute of the dominant powers in the world today. 

Special attention must be paid to so-called rogue states that have access to space-related 

technology and may even be spacefaring but do not have the conventional forces to 

achieve their policy aims. Those aims tend to be very intense, and these players may seek 

space weapons as an asymmetric hedge against spacefaring adversaries who may try to 

coerce them.

The dominant military powers in the world, some of whom are potential adversaries, also 

tend to be the dominant spacefaring states. Because of the economic benefits and 

exponential enhancements that spacepower delivers to terrestrial warfighting, those states 

are under increasing pressure to defend their space systems and to counter those of their 

potential adversaries. This may lead to a space weapons race and an immediate escalation 

of hostilities to "wipe the skies" of enemy satellites should war break out between two or 

more dominant military space powers.29

When assessing the interplay between the spectrum of conflict and the spectrum of 

belligerents, it may be the case that war between two weak actors will not likely extend 

into space. However, if the power is perceived to be disparate, a weak actor is far more 

likely to use space weapons against a powerful state as an asymmetric defensive move.30

A powerful state may counter the space systems in use by a weaker adversary, but it is 

likely to do so by placing diplomatic pressure on commercial vendors, or executing 

attacks on their ground stations, or launching highly selective covert attacks on the 

satellites they use by employing temporary and reversible means.

Should two dominant spacefaring powers go directly to war with each other with intense 

motives, both will find it critical to preserve their space systems and will consider it a 

dangerous liability to allow their enemy to exploit theirs. Given the ability of spacepower 

to cut the fog and friction of war while connecting military forces at the tactical, 

operational, and strategic level, it is likely that space systems will be primary targets that 

will be negated in the opening moves of war. The fight for space is likely to be intense 

and brief. Temporary means of negation will likely switch to permanent methods of 

destruction to remove doubt in the minds of commanders. 

Offense and Defense 

Twenty-six centuries ago, Sun Tzu pointed out, "Invincibility lies in the defense; the 

possibility of victory in the attack. One defends when his strength is inadequate; he 

attacks when it is abundant."31 All warfare depends on interplay between the offense and 

the defense. They are "neither mutually exclusive nor clearly distinct. . . . each includes 

elements of the other."32 Defense generally implies a negative aim of protection and of 

preserving the status quo in the face of an attack. Conversely, offense generally pursues a 

positive aim by inflicting damage on the adversary to coerce him into accepting terms. 

However, consider that there are defensive aspects resident in every attack. Warriors of 

old carried their shields into battle when they attacked with their swords to protect them 

from the thrusts of the defenders. The offense is also resident in every defense. 
Remember that the Royal Air Force won the great defensive Battle of Britain by 

attacking the invading German bombers. 

The general goal of offense is to inflict such damage on the adversary that they are 

defensively culminated, meaning they can no longer resist the attack and must either 

accept terms or be annihilated. Conversely, the goal of defense is to resist the attack and 

inflict such costs on the adversary that they are offensively culminated, meaning they can 

no longer attack and can only defend themselves. These concepts will come into play

when we discuss space control and space denial.

It is often said that defense is the stronger form of warfare.33 This is not true in space—

today. Defending satellites and their data links is a difficult proposition at best. Satellites 

are delicate, fragile devices that can easily fall prey to any number of space weapons that 

currently exist, such as lasers, radio frequency jamming, brute force weapons, and 

surface-to-space missiles with kinetic kill vehicles—many of which are relatively small, 

mobile systems. While satellites in low Earth orbit are the most vulnerable to lasers and 

lofted kinetic kill vehicles, satellites all the way out in the geostationary belt and in highly 

elliptical orbits share a universal vulnerability to radio frequency jamming and 

electromagnetic brute force attacks. Satellites do not need to be physically destroyed to 

be rendered ineffective. Satellites are commanded (as applicable) and provide their 

services to ground stations and users via the electromagnetic spectrum. Hence, there is a 

rule: no spectrum means no spacepower. The rapid proliferation of jammers and 

electronic intrusion devices around the world in recent years occurred upon recognition 

of this rule.

Defenses to date are paltry at best.An adversary with robust space denial weapons may be 

able to negate all friendly space systems in a matter of hours; therefore, it is imperative 

for space powers to acquire the ability to find, fix, track, target, and destroy an 

adversary's space weapons very quickly. Such systems may reside on land, at sea, in the 

air, or in space. It will require close coordination with terrestrial forces to engage them 

against space weapons at the behest of the space commander. 

In essence, today's space defense rests on the assurances in the Outer Space Treaty, 

which imperfectly implies that space is a peaceful sanctuary, although it only bans the 

basing of weapons of mass destruction in space. Does this mean all lesser threats are 

allowed? This is a hotly debated point. No one contests language in article 51 of the 

United Nations charter that gives states the inherent right of self-defense. Presumably, 

this includes self-defense from space weapons and space-based weapons. It can be argued 

that space weapons are a matter of the inherent right of self-defense. The slope to space 

warfare is slippery indeed.

Although offense is the dominant form of war in space today, this will not always be the 

case. Defense is possible. Three principles will likely guide the development of future 

space defenses. 
First, if you can't see it, you can't hit it. Satellites are already getting smaller—too small 

for most space surveillance networks to detect and track. This trend will likely continue 

not only as a matter of cost savings, but also as a matter of stealthy defense. Avoiding 

detection includes maneuvering satellites to undisclosed wartime orbits. 

Second, all warfare is based on deception.

34 Potential adversaries collect intelligence on 

each other's space systems and make their estimates based on their intelligence 

assessments. Action must be taken to deceive potential adversaries into underestimating 

the value of critical systems and overestimating the value of inconsequential systems. In 

addition, the use of wartime-only modes of operation, frequencies, and other 

unanticipated behaviors will further complicate an adversary's problems. 

Third, there is strength in numbers. The age of the capital satellites is over. Employing 

only one or two large, very expensive satellites to fulfill a critical mission area, such as 

reconnaissance, is foolish. Future space systems must be large constellations of smaller, 

cheaper, and, in many cases, lower-fidelity systems swarming in various orbits that 

exploit ground processing to derive high-fidelity solutions. In addition, swarms improve 

global access and presence. 

The best defense for a space system in the 21st century may be the dual-use system that is 

owned, operated, and used by broad international partners. A hostile foe may be deterred 

from attacking a satellite if doing so comes with the likelihood of expanding the war 

against their cause. This is also dependent on the hostile foe's policy aim. If it is intense, 

such as national survival or radical ideology, they may attack anyway. 

The term attack is practically synonymous with offense, but it must be understood in a 

much more nuanced way regarding spacepower than is generally ascribed among those 

who hype the threat of direct kinetic kill antisatellite weapons that may smash satellites to 

bits. It must be remembered that space systems are comprised of space, ground, and user 

segments integrated through data links. Any of these segments or links can be targeted by 

an attack to gain the desired effect. A specific target within a space system is selected and 

a weapon is chosen to attack that target in a certain way to achieve the desired level of 

negation. The first includes temporary and reversible effects such as deception, 

disruption, and denial. The second includes permanent physical effects such as 

degradation and destruction. They can be described this way:

• Deception employs manipulation, distortion, or falsification of information to 

induce adversaries to react in a manner contrary to their interests.

• Disruption is the temporary impairment of some or all of a space system's 

capability to produce effects, usually without physical damage.

• Denial is the temporary elimination of some or all of a space system's capability 

to produce effects, usually without physical damage.

• Degradation is the permanent impairment of some or all of a space system's 

capability to produce effects, usually with physical damage.
• Destruction is the permanent elimination of all of a space system's capabilities to 

produce effects, usually with physical damage (called hard kill or, without 

physical damage, soft kill).35

Ultimately, the level of negation is chosen to achieve the desired effect that serves the 

objectives given to space forces in support of the overall strategy and operational plans of 

the war. A very low-intensity war is likely to involve covert use of the temporary and 

reversible levels of negation. Conversely, more intense wars will probably tend toward 

the permanent levels. 

There is a drawback to temporary levels of negation. It is exceptionally difficult to 

determine if the application of the weapon is achieving the desired effect. Permanent 

levels of negation may deliver more easily observable confirmation of effects. This is 

somewhat analogous to the problems determining a tank kill in Operation Desert Storm. 

Some commanders considered a tank killed if its unit was attacked and the tank was no 

longer moving. Others did not agree with this. But all agreed that it was a kill if the tank 

had its turret blown off.

It must be kept in mind that a small number of powerful directed energy space weapons 

can quickly cause permanent levels of negation to dozens of satellites. On the other hand, 

it would take several dozen space weapons such as jammers that only cause temporary 

effects to negate the constellations of the larger spacefaring states. Since noise jammers 

are only effective when broadcasting, and broadcasting jammers are relatively easy to 

find and target, there are incentives to develop space weapons that cause permanent 

effects.

Spacepower in Warfare 

The purpose of security spacepower is to provide capabilities to assist in achieving 

political and military objectives. It is an independent form of power that can be used 

alone or in concert with other forms of power to achieve desired ends. Space is a place 

where humans live and place uninhabited systems that help resolve problems. It begins 

above the Earth's surface at the lowest altitude where a satellite can sustain a circular 

orbit, albeit briefly, at approximately 93 miles and extends outward to infinity—

excluding heavenly bodies.36 Eventually, humanity will extend its interests fully across 

cislunar space and beyond, especially for economic development. Security spacepower 

will protect those interests, just as navies protect passage and commerce on the seas. 

Someday in the future, populations and their political entities will likely migrate into 

space as well. For now, however, humans live on the surface of the Earth, and 

contemporary spacepower in this context refers to the struggles occurring there, but this 

will evolve over time to include the cislunar region and the Moon. 

The reason for going to near-Earth space for security purposes is to gain access to regions 

of the Earth where terrestrial forces either cannot go or cannot loiter as economically as 

some satellites. A relatively small number of similar satellites spread out in orbital space 

can survey the entire Earth's surface, which gives space-based constellations the ability to 
perform missions on a global scale. States perform many missions in space. In the 

opening years of the 21st century, these missions are primarily informational—that is, 

providing command, control, communications, and computer (C4) support; positioning, 

navigation, and timing; intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance (ISR); and weather 

support to terrestrial forces, among others. Air, land, and sea forces also perform 

missions like these, but only space systems (and some terrestrial cyber networks) perform 

them continuously on a global scale. These space networks create a global infrastructure 

that links together expeditionary forces deployed anywhere in the world and connects 

these forces with each other in all media, and with their leadership. 

When War Prevention Fails 

Five terms are presented below that may seem familiar to anyone who has read U.S. Air 

Force doctrine regarding space: space control, space support, space denial, space 

logistics, and space attack. However, these terms are used differently here, because the 

driving concepts are pulled apart and analyzed more closely to reveal greater nuances that 

have much further-reaching strategic implications than the relatively simple and coarse 

definitions offered in current doctrine. 

Space control.The primary mission of space forces at all times is assuring relative space 

control, which means securing the space medium to provide freedom of access to space 

and freedom of action in space for all lawful and nonhostile spacefaring activities.Space 

control is that which provides security when freedom of access or action in space is 

contested. 

Space control is not only for military purposes. It allows civil, commercial, and other 

space activities to continue uninterrupted around the globe. It provides the benign 

environment that is a necessary precondition for most spacefaring activities. The 

importance of ensuring uninterrupted space commerce cannot be overstated. All states are 

increasingly reliant on space systems for all matters critical to their economic well being. 

Space control efforts must minimize disruptions to the flow of the global economy. 

During war, every effort should be made to limit the effects only to the belligerents. This 

minimizes the risk of a war expanding by drawing in other states seeking to protect their 

interests by force. Space control also requires preventing the creation of space debris, 

which becomes a hazard to spacefaring activities and denies freedom of action in space to 

all actors in the vicinity of debris fields. Such is the negative aim. 

Achieving the negative aim of space control requires passively or actively defending 

space systems under attack. This may require attacks to suppress or destroy the 

adversary's offensive space weapons, which may be based in the air, on land, at sea, or in 

space. It may be necessary to drive a hostile foe all the way to offensive culmination in 

space to arrive at the security required to assure free passage of commerce and other 

activities. The policy, strategy, and situation will dictate the degree of offensive space 

control that is used. Factors to consider will be the time and place where space control 

must be gained, how rapidly it is needed, what parts of the adversary space system(s) are 
vulnerable, the possibility of collateral damage, how long space control must be 

sustained, and the desired level of negation (for example, destruction, degradation, denial, 

disruption, deception). Space control does not need to be total in order to be effective. In 

fact, attempting to exact total space control over an adversary, to include dominating all 

decisive points and the equatorial chokepoint, would be counterproductive as 

preparations to do so would drain the budget and be highly wasteful.37

Space control also has a positive aim, which is to sustain the requisite degree of freedom 

of action to enable friendly space forces to continue or expand the missions of space 

support to friendly forces, space denial of adversary space capabilities (if required), and 

space logistics to sustain friendly operations on orbit, and it someday may include the 

mission of space attack of striking adversary targets from space. Each of these missions 

will have a priority dictated by the policy and strategy they support. 

Space situational awareness is a most vital component of space control. Freedom of 

access to space and freedom of action in space require timely and reliable information 

about what is actually happening on orbit. It includes what could be called space traffic 

management and debris avoidance, in addition to characterization of threats and anomaly 

detection and attribution, as well as attack assessment. The ability to accurately 

characterize what is happening in space becomes more critical as the world becomes 

more space reliant, as the number and frequency of spacefaring activities increase, and as 

space weapons proliferate.

Competition for space control is not limited to warfare. Such competition also occurs 

during peacetime negotiations for treaties, laws, and rules of the road that in any way 

curtail the freedom of access to space or freedom of action in space. This is why some 

countries, such as the United States, are very cautious about entering into such 

negotiations. The long-term implications of various forms of agreements are difficult to 

anticipate. There is little doubt, however, that additional treaties, laws, and rules of the 

road are warranted to codify the appropriate and inappropriate behaviors of spacefaring 

actors. This will soon be critical to accommodate the rapidly increasing number of 

satellites on orbit, space tourism, space hotels, and lunar and asteroid resource 

development.

Space support. This includes all of the space force enhancements and information 

services that modern militaries have become accustomed to. The negative aim of space 

support includes providing all of the space services associated with the surveillance strike 

complex, which includes all those space sensors, communications links, and other space 

capabilities that allow terrestrial forces to defend friendly interests. It encompasses such 

things as warnings, tip-offs, indications, cueing, and assessments of attack by air, land, 

sea, or space forces. It includes all of those space systems used in any way to integrate 

passive and active defensive measures. An example is the missile warning network, 

which detects missile launches by satellite, routes the data into the fire control system of 

missile defense batteries, and sends it to commanders via communications satellites.
The positive aim of space support includes providing all the space services associated 

with the reconnaissance strike complex. The reconnaissance strike complex encompasses 

all those space sensors, communications links, and other space capabilities that allow 

terrestrial forces to attack the enemy. It includes the entire space-enabled ability to find, 

fix, track, target, engage, negate, and assess enemy targets. An example is a 

reconnaissance satellite finding an enemy tank, routing this data to a strike aircraft via 

communications satellite, and guiding the aircraft's munition to target via the global 

positioning system, while observing battle damage indications and other assessments 

from space. 

The surveillance and reconnaissance strike complexes of most actors have many spacerelated elements in common. The global positioning system, for example, provides data 

that is typically critical to both complexes. Of particular note is the blending of 

commercial assets, such as communications satellite services, into the strike complexes 

of states and nonstate actors. Commercial space systems used by the enemy to advance 

its war effort, including the satellites on orbit, are valid military targets. Their likelihood 

of being attacked is directly related to the intensity of the war aims of the belligerents and 

their ability to strike the relevant commercial systems. 

Here a moral dilemma arises. Is it better to attack a ground station with a high probability 

of killing human beings, or is it better to attack a satellite with no possibility of human 

death? No answer can be given here, for the answer is entirely dependent on the policy 

and strategy, both formed in the unique context of the situation.

Space denial. Denial of adversary space forces is as important as space control. Its 

essence is the use of space weapons to negate adversary space systems. Its negative aim 

is to defend friendly interests by negating the enemy's space systems associated with their 

reconnaissance strike complex, thereby increasing the fog and friction inherent to the 

enemy's offensive efforts to hasten its offensive culmination. 

Space denial can be used for two positive aims. The first includes space denial attacks 

against adversary space systems associated with their surveillance strike complex to 

facilitate other attacks against them and to hasten their defensive culmination.

The second positive aim of space denial has received little attention. It involves negating 

adversary space systems simply to raise their costs in the war effort, in an attempt to 

coerce them into accepting terms. This can be done as part of an overall punishment 

strategy or risk strategy of imposing costs on the enemy with the promise of imposing 

even greater costs in the future.An interesting twist to this strategy might be limiting 

strikes only to satellites in orbit. Nobody dies, but there are tangible costs imposed. It 

might be possible to coerce a state that is heavily reliant on space services into accepting 

modest terms by negating only their satellites in orbit. Such prospects heighten the need 

for effective space defenses for highly reliant states. States that do not find themselves as 

dependent on space have far less of a need for space defenses and may become concerned 

when others merely discuss defensive systems, since the line between offense and 

defense is so easily blurred. 
It is important to remember that an adversary's satellites are global assets. It may be 

politically untenable for a number of reasons to permanently damage an adversary's 

satellite. For example, while an imagery satellite may threaten to disclose friendly troop 

movements in one region, that same satellite might perform treaty verification on the 

opposite side of the globe or other missions that there is a friendly interest in preserving. 

In many scenarios, space denial might best be limited to very localized and temporary 

effects. 

The best way to deny an adversary access to space is to destroy their space launch 

facilities, but we must also be aware that the adversary may contract their spacelift with 

other countries where they may have satellites in storage. The best way to deny space 

support to an adversary is to directly negate the satellites they use. While some satellite 

systems may be particularly susceptible to the destruction of their ground stations, this 

may have only limited effect on other satellite systems that may degrade gracefully in the 

absence of ground control. It is also likely that an adversary will employ mobile ground 

stations for tactically important space systems that require frequent ground contact. This 

not only makes targeting ground stations more difficult, but it also highlights the need to 

negate an adversary's satellites on orbit. It is also possible to attack the users of space 

support by jamming their receivers through a variety of techniques. This has the benefit 

of localized and temporary effects. In many scenarios, it is likely that a combination of 

attacks on all three segments of a space system (ground stations, satellites on orbit, and 

user equipment), as well as their linkages, will be required to achieve the desired effect. 

Space control and space denial efforts will be complicated if an adversary is using thirdparty launch facilities, satellites, or ground control systems provided by commercial 

vendors, international consortia, or an ally. Diplomatic efforts will likely be required to 

eliminate third-party support to adversaries, but if the political will exists, friendly forces 

must be ready to expand the conflict by striking wherever adversaries receive space 

support. If diplomatic efforts fail and policy does not allow expansion of the conflict to 

strike third-party targets, then the adversary has a sanctuary they will likely exploit.

Space logistics. Space logistics are those activities to sustain satellites and their 

capabilities on orbit. It includes launching satellites to orbit, on-orbit check-out, 

maintenance, refueling, repair, and the like. With regard to wartime space logistics, it is 

imperative for spacefaring states to repair or replace lost satellite capabilities on orbit. 

The goal is to rapidly restore capabilities before they affect political, economic, and 

combat operations. Activating on-orbit spares, leasing commercial satellite services, 

launching new satellites to replace those lost through attrition, or gaining access to an 

ally's satellite services may do this. It is also essential to repair or replace lost satellite 

ground control systems. Methods for doing this may include transferring ground control 

responsibility to another location (fixed or mobile), leasing commercial support, or 

obtaining ground support from an allied state.

A word of caution is warranted regarding the launch of new satellites to replace those lost 

to enemy attack. Unless there is complete certainty that the adversary is offensively 

culminated and all adversary space weapons have been accounted for and successfully 
negated, launching a satellite of the same design into the same orbit will be like throwing 

skeet in front of a shooter. In practice, there is no way to be absolutely certain that the 

threat is completely removed. 

Space attack. It is possible that someone will put weapons on orbit that can attack 

terrestrial targets. Space attack could have a negative aim of striking an adversary's 

advancing forces or offensive systems as a matter of defending friendly interests and 

hastening the enemy's offensive culmination. Space attack could also have two positive 

aims. The first could be striking adversary forces or their defensive systems to expedite 

their defensive culmination. The next could be attacking their centers of gravity directly 

as part of the war-winning effort.

There are many good reasons for not putting weapons in space for the purpose of space 

attack. Among them are the enormous expenses of putting them in space and their 

vulnerability once there if they are left undefended. But there is a paradoxical logic to 

warfare that increases the likelihood of someone actually doing it: Because there are 

many good reasons not to put weapons in space, putting weapons in space makes little 

sense; no one is expecting weapons in space; therefore, an actor achieves the element of 

surprise by putting weapons in space!

Situational awareness has always been critical in diplomacy and warfare, but in the new 

era of precision targeting, situational awareness must be equally precise—a bomb is only 

as accurate as the coordinates used by the planner, the warfighter, and the munition itself. 

Precision targeting is well understood, but the need for precision surveillance and 

reconnaissance is not. 

Multitudes of ISR sensors in all media characterize the modern battlespace. Some collect 

signals intelligence, while others collect photoreconnaissance data. Still others collect 

radar information. These sensors and their operators not only attempt to identify targets, 

but also try to determine each target's precise coordinates. The ability of different sensors 

to determine the precise coordinates of targets varies, but in general, terrestrial sensors 

are much better at this than space-based sensors for several reasons. First, space systems 

are typically much farther away from the targets. Second, satellites in the lowest orbits 

are moving very fast in relation to targets and have relatively short dwell times on targets 

compared to terrestrial systems, and satellites in higher orbits are much more distant and 

are generally less able to refine target coordinates as precisely. Third, satellite sensors 

degrade over time, and there currently is no effort under way to perform physical 

maintenance on them to keep them in prime condition. Finally, given the relatively few 

ISR satellites in low Earth orbit, continuous coverage of areas of interest from space with 

the most precise space-based sensors is currently impossible. 

In sum, aircraft have several distinct advantages over spacecraft in regard to theater ISR 

collection, but space-derived surveillance and reconnaissance information is critical to 

diplomatic and military operations because it provides a "first look" into denied areas and 

at the battlespace and assists planners in finding and coarsely geolocating many targets 

before terrestrial forces move into the region. As a rule of thumb, today's space-derived 
surveillance and reconnaissance is useful in finding 80 percent of the targets and is able 

to determine their location to roughly 80 percent of the accuracy required to conduct 

precision strikes. In some cases, space systems do better than 80 percent in finding and 

fixing targets, and in other cases, they do worse. What is important is the tremendous 

advantage space systems provide politicians and commanders by giving them a highquality first look into the situation they face. With this information, they are able to make 

decisions about how to employ their limited terrestrial surveillance and reconnaissance 

assets (aircraft, ships, submarines, reconnaissance ground forces, etc.) more efficiently to 

refine the surveillance and reconnaissance picture to the quality they desire for the 

operations they are considering. In some cases, the first look from space may suffice, but 

usually terrestrial surveillance and reconnaissance assets are required. During combat 

operations, space-based surveillance and reconnaissance sensors continue to provide data, 

filling gaps in coverage by theater assets. Space-based surveillance and reconnaissance 

sensors also frequently cue terrestrially based sensors, as was the case during the Gulf 

War with missile warning satellites cueing Patriot batteries to intercept Iraq's inbound 

Scud missiles.

Perhaps most important of all, day in and day out, during war and peace, spacepower 

provides the 80 percent first look on a global scale. It allows analysts to watch the world 

and report tip-offs, warnings, and indications that give political and military leaders the 

freedom to employ their terrestrial forces more expeditiously and with greater confidence 

that another threat is not more pressing. Spacepower literally watches the backs of 

terrestrial forces to make sure no threat is sneaking up behind them. This allows greater 

concentration of terrestrial forces in theaters of combat operations because space-based 

surveillance and reconnaissance assets are sufficient to act as a kind of global sentry. This 

sort of mission is ideally suited to space systems because they have unimpeded access 

around the globe and relatively few assets are required to sustain surveillance and 

reconnaissance missions on a global scale. 

Much more is possible. By increasing the number of low Earth orbiting sensors, 

continuously improving the quality of the sensors, and developing the means to service 

and repair them (either on orbit or by recovery and relaunch), the 80 percent rule of 

thumb will creep closer toward the 100 percent solution, despite the warfighter's demand 

for ever-increasing precision. As space systems becomes more capable, is it likely that 

they will replace terrestrial forms of surveillance and reconnaissance collection? No. 

Aerial reconnaissance did not eliminate the need for land and sea forces to conduct 

reconnaissance of their own. There is no reason to believe that space-based 

reconnaissance will replace any other form of reconnaissance either.

Spacepower does not usurp missions from other forces. Spacepower assets give a state 

new core competencies for its military order of battle. The ability to do anything 

continuously on a global scale is a new contribution to warfare made possible by 

spacepower. The various C4ISR capabilities, including weather observation, missile 

warning, and navigation and timing broadcasts, give space-enabled forces a distinct 

asymmetric advantage over adversaries in the opening days of the 21st century. This 
advantage will evaporate over time as other actors on the world stage develop, lease, or 

borrow similar capabilities. 

Space forces do not compete with terrestrial forces for roles and missions. Airpower, land 

power, seapower, spacepower, and now cyberpower bring different capabilities to 

modern warfare. The armed forces of many nations train their warfighters in highly 

specialized ways with the objective of being able to dominate operations within their 

respective media. Operations in each media require centralized control by practitioners of 

that form of power, in close coordination with the other warfighters, to ensure the 

optimum management of resources and integration of efforts to achieve the objectives of 

strategy.

A great fallacy resulting from the prevalent budget-driven integration mindset is the oftcited statement that "missions will migrate to space when it becomes reasonable to do 

so." This presumes that commanders in forward areas are willing to trade highly flexible 

organic terrestrial assets for less flexible (and often less capable) space systems that 

another commander will likely manage as global assets. Economic considerations may 

force such a compromise, but a more prudent approach is to develop robust space 

capabilities in addition to airpower, land power, seapower, and cyberpower assets. 

Remember, the difference between space systems and terrestrial systems is that space 

systems provide global access and global presence during both war and peace. 

When space forces eventually obtain systems that can create physical effects at any 

location on the surface of the Earth (for example, conventional bombing), this will not 

replace the standing requirement for aircraft and missiles to be able to do the same thing, 

just as the bomber did not replace artillery. Space operations are expensive, and 

economic considerations may require air delivery of munitions. Exceptions include times 

when cost is not a consideration, such as combat in areas where aircraft are denied 

access, when aircraft cannot respond to a time-critical situation as quickly as spacecraft, 

when only a specialized weapon delivered from space will have the desired probability of 

killing a target, and when surprise is of the utmost importance.

There is unquestionably some overlap between the capabilities of spacepower and other 

forms of power, but this is a source of strength, not waste. Just as the triad of bombers, 

submarines, and missiles during the Cold War prevented either adversary from gaining a 

significant advantage should their opponent successfully counter one set of capabilities, 

today's redundancy prevents an adversary from gaining a significant advantage should 

they successfully counter space-based systems or other terrestrial forces. There will be 

some adjustments in force structures as space capabilities become more robust, but no

mission in any service should ever move entirely to space. Under no circumstances 

should all of the eggs ever be placed in the space basket. Instead, there should be an 

integrated combined arms approach.

During time of peace, spacepower assets monitor the globe, helping to identify and 

characterize potential threats. When a threat emerges, political and military leaders may 

opt to send terrestrially based surveillance and reconnaissance sensors into the area of 
interest to get a closer look. Should hostilities break out, space forces will gain whatever 

degree of space control is required and will contribute whatever they can to help friendly 

forces in theater in terms of space support to the surveillance and reconnaissance strike 

complexes, but they still must watch the rest of the world, in every other theater, looking 

for tip-offs, warnings, and indications of other threats. 

Space attack will take many different forms, but it seems likely that space-based weapons 

will fill specific niches, ideal for only a handful of missions during certain phases of 

operations. No claim is made that spacepower by itself can be decisive in general 

conventional warfare, but in certain circumstances, it may help set the conditions for 

victory by friendly forces. Conversely, if space forces are defeated, this may turn the tide 

of the war against friendly forces and contribute to defeat. There may be certain forms of 

limited warfare where the coercive application of space systems may achieve the political 

and military aims of an operation. If this defines decision, then so be it.

Conclusion 

The primary value of spacepower is war prevention, not support to warfighters. It does 

this by providing transparency into observable human activities around the globe and into 

space that removes uncertainties and security concerns or allows them to be addressed 

with a better approximation of the facts. Space also provides opportunities for 

cooperative ventures on spacefaring activities across all sectors. These ventures can 

become the framework of better international relationships and confidence-building 

maneuvers between potential adversaries. Powerful spacefaring states may be able to use 

martial space strength in traditional ways, such as providing assurances and using 

dissuasive and deterrent strategies, to prevent wars.

If history serves as a template for the future in space, then space will become a 

warfighting medium. It is already heavily militarized, with powerful spacefaring states 

using the medium to enable their surveillance and reconnaissance strike complexes in 

ways that accelerate the scale, timing, and tempo of combat operations exponentially 

beyond non-spacefaring actors' ability to cope. Weak actors are likely to employ space 

weapons in an attempt to counter the advantage space confers on powerful states. The 

most dangerous situation, however, occurs if two powerful spacefaring states go to war 

with each other. If the motives are intense, it is likely that they will be forced to counter 

each other's space systems in the very early stages. At present, there are inadequate 

defenses for space systems, but defense is possible. Space denial strategies of warfare are 

likely to evolve, wherein a belligerent merely attacks an adversary's space systems to 

inflict costs or to induce strategic paralysis on the enemy before offering terms. Finally, 

space is very much part of the military mix of all actors, state and nonstate, and it must be 

recognized that spacepower is not a replacement for terrestrial forces, but an additional 

set of tools that delivers unique capabilities.
Notes

1. The claim that the proper primary mission for spacepower is war prevention was first made to the 

author of this chapter by Brigadier General S. Pete Worden, USAF (Ret.), in the fall of 2005. He 

expands this to claim that spacepower is the primary means that states can use to prevent wars. See 

also chapter 30 in this volume by Worden, "Future Strategy and Professional Development: A 

Roadmap." 

2. The security concern of facing the threat of a Soviet missile attack faced was so great that the 

Eisenhower administration tolerated 12 successive failures of Corona systems before the 13th

actually delivered usable imagery. Described in William E. Burrows, The New Ocean (New York: 

Modern Library, 1999), 232–233.

3. A National Intelligence Estimate released in February 1960 assessed the Soviets as having as 

many as 140–200 ICBMs on launchers by mid-1961. Dwayne A. Day et al., Eye in the Sky: The 

Story of the Corona Spy Satellite (Washington, DC: Smithsonian Institution, 1998), 216–217.

4. Ibid., 217.

5. Carl von Clausewitz, On War, ed. and trans. Michael Howard and Peter Paret (Princeton: 

Princeton University Press, 1984), 140. In describing what he calls the "uncertainty of all 

information," Clausewitz describes the quality of information in war as affected by a kind of fog, 

which he claims "tends to make things seem grotesque and larger than they really are." 

6. Google Earth is an Internet-based imagery database set in an easy-to-use imagery manipulation 

program that is expanding to show relatively high-quality images of the entire Earth. 

7. Tara Shankar Sahay, "Pakistan Feels Let Down by U.S. Spy Satellites," Rediff on the Net, May 13, 

1998, available at <www.rediff.com/news/1998/may/13spy.htm>; and Krishnan Gurswamy, 

"India Tricks U.S. Satellites," Associated Press, May 19, 1998, available at 

<http://abcnews.go.com/sections/world/DailyNews/India980519_nukes.html>.

8. Clausewitz, 119–121. Clausewitz, who limited his discussion only to war, described friction in this 

way: "Everything in war is very simple, but the simplest thing is difficult." This is also true of 

large organizations and partnerships. But like a machine, the more frequently the partners work 

together, the easier it becomes, as if the process has a way of lubricating itself. In this way, 

partnering may be difficult as first but will become easier with time; hence, it will reduce the 

friction. 

9. Soft power defined by Joseph S. Nye, Jr., Soft Power: The Means to Success in World Politics

(New York: Public Affairs, 2004), 5.

10. One may wonder if the successful Chinese antisatellite test conducted in January 2007 is an 

example of a state attempting to establish its dissuasive and deterrent powers against the leading 

spacefaring state at that time, the United States.

11. "Positive and Negative Security Assurances," available at 

<www.reachingcriticalwill.org/legal/NSA.htm>.

12. Derived from the definition of soft power found in Nye, 5.

13. This is part of the central thesis found in Everett C. Dolman, Astropolitik: Classical Geopolitics in 

the Space Age (London: Frank Cass Publishers, 2002).

14. Thomas C. Schelling, Arms and Influence (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1966), 3. 

15. Clausewitz, 77.

16. Author interview with Michael Krepon, May 10, 2007.

17. Earlier ASAT tests by the United States and the Soviet Union from the early 1960s through the 

1980s may also be examples of this phenomenon. It is by no means limited to the Chinese. See 

description of U.S. and Soviet ASAT tests in Clayton S. Chung, Defending Space: U.S. AntiSatellite Warfare and Space Weaponry (New York: Osprey Publishing, 2006), 32–37.

18. Author interview with Jeffrey Lewis, May 27, 2007.

19. Karl Mueller, "Totem and Taboo," Astropolitics I, no. 1 (September 2003), 26–28.

20. Colin S. Gray, Another Bloody Century: Future Warfare (London: Phoenix, 2006), 307.

21. It has been postulated that the weaponization of space will occur in one of two ways, based on 

either a single trigger event or a slippery slope. See Barry D. Watts, The Military Uses of Space: A 
Diagnostic Assessment (Washington, DC: Center for Strategic and Budgetary Assessments, 

February 2001), 98.

22. Clausewitz, 87. Clausewitz' famous dictum that "war, therefore, is an act of policy," serves as a 

central proposition for On War.

23. Extrapolated from Clausewitz, 605. 

24. Sun Tzu, The Art of War, trans. Ralph D. Sawyer (Boulder, CO: Westview Press, 1994); 

Clausewitz, previously cited.

25. Clausewitz, 605–607.

26. Colin S. Gray, Modern Strategy (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1999), 256–257.

27. Clausewitz, 87.

28. Brian E. Fredriksson, "Space Power in Joint Operations: Evolving Concepts," Air and Space 

Power Journal (Summer 2004), available at 

<www.airpower.maxwell.af.mil/airchronicles/apj/apj04/sum04/fredriksson.html>.

29. The urgency felt by powerful spacefaring states to "wipe the skies" is the thesis of a book by 

William B. Scott et al., Space Wars: The First Six Hours of World War III (New York: Forge, 

2007), 7–16.

30. Ibid.

31. Sun Tzu, The Art of War, trans S.B. Griffith (New York: Oxford University Press, 1982), 85.

32. Warfighting: The Marine Corps Book of Strategy (New York: Currency-Doubleday, 1994), 30.

33. Clausewitz, 84; Warfighting, 30. 

34. Sun Tzu, The Art of War, ed. James Clavell, trans. Lionel Giles (New York: Delacort Press, 1983), 

11.

35. Air Force Doctrine Document 2–2, Space Operations, November 27, 2001, 13.

36. There is no universally agreed definition of where space begins and ends, but for this discussion, 

the author is only talking about space in terms of in Earth orbit and beyond. For a fuller discussion 

of debate of where space begins and ends, see M.V. Smith, Ten Propositions Regarding 

Spacepower (Maxwell Air Force Base, AL: Air University Press) 4, 38.

37. This point was brought out by Mahan with regard to command of the sea; total control is not 

necessary. This point is developed in relation to spacefaring activities in Dolman, 34. 
Chapter 18:

U.S. Military Spacepower: Conceptual Underpinnings and Practices

John M. Collins

Congressional legislation designates the fundamental roles of the U.S. Army, Navy, Air 

Force, Marine Corps, Coast Guard, and U.S. Special Operations Command 

(USSOCOM). The Department of Defense (DOD) assigns implementing functions. 

Resultant responsibilities strongly influence the characteristics and respective budgetary 

shares of those building blocks, while military space forces remain on the outside looking 

in. That is where they will stay as long as present trends persist, because few movers and 

shakers on Capitol Hill and in the Pentagon understand that the word aerospace is an 

oxymoron. This chapter tells why and recommends corrective actions.

Aerospace is an Oxymoron 

The "wild blue yonder" is pitch black above Earth's atmosphere. Hard-to-alter orbital 

patterns preclude loop-the-loops, barrel rolls, and other flamboyant maneuvers that 

fighter pilots favor. Astronauts cannot go down in flames where oxygen is nonexistent, 

and their vehicles cannot roar in the soundless vacuum that permeates space.

Geographic contexts indeed differentiate space from land, sea, and air more clearly than 

any other factors.1 Air, water, weather, climate, and vegetation are confined to Earth, 

which—along with other planets, our Moon, and asteroids—contains the only land forms 

and natural resources. Cosmic radiation, solar winds, micrometeorites, and greatly 

attenuated gravity are unique properties of space, which has no shape or known extent. 

Shock waves are nonexistent. Visibility is far better than the best obtainable on Earth. 

Maneuver room is virtually limitless, except on our Moon and other orbs. Day-night 

cycles vary with altitude. Astronauts in low Earth orbits, for example, may race from 

light to dark to light every 90 minutes or so, while luminary transitions in deep space 

proceed imperceptibly.

Orbital distances are meaningful mainly in terms of time, except for communications, 

which proceed at the speed of light (186,000 miles per second). Space has no north, east, 

south, or west to designate locations and directions. Declination, the astronomical analog 

of latitude, is the angular distance north or south of the celestial Equator. Right ascension 

is the counterpart of longitude, and the dimly lit constellation Aries, against which 

spectators on Earth see the Sun when it crosses our Equator in springtime, defines the 

prime meridian. Navigators determine positions from that celestial equivalent of the 

Greenwich Observatory. 

That distinctive medium demands a distinctive military spacepower school of thought, 

plus roles, functions, and concepts designed to assist the development of policies, 
strategies, tactics, plans, and programs for precisely the same reasons that armies, navies, 

and air forces demand different modus operandi.Cavernous voids currently exist in most 

respects, because neither Congress nor DOD facilitates such developments.

Military Spacepower Theories 

Spacepower theories presumably provide the focus for this forum, but theories by 

definition expand knowledge bases with no particular purposes in mind. Albert Einstein, 

for example, never imagined that his Special Theory of Relativity with E=MC2at its core 

would spawn nuclear weapons. Nobody predicted that the tiny rocket Robert Goddard 

launched from a cabbage patch in 1926 would become the great-granddaddy of all 

ballistic missiles and space boosters. This survey consequently concentrates on schools of 

thought, officially assigned U.S. military spacepower responsibilities, and concepts 

designed to solve offensive, defensive, and deterrent problems.

Customary Schools of Military Thought 

Schools of thought are basic beliefs accepted as authoritative by subscribers who share 

common characteristics, outlooks, opinions, and values. Continental, maritime, 

aeronautical, and special operations schools currently dominate the mindsets of U.S. 

military concept formulators. The capsulated descriptions below deliberately 

oversimplify salient characteristics to emphasize peculiarities. The first three lean heavily 

on J.C. Wylie's exposition of the special operations school, Military Strategy: A General 

Theory of Power Control.2

Continental school. Adherents of the continental school, who are direct descendents of 

German strategist Carl von Clausewitz,3 tend to compartmentalize Planet Earth into 

theaters of operation, regional areas of responsibility, and local zones of action. They 

contend that the defeat of enemy armed forces, mainly by manpower-intensive armies, is 

the ultimate object of war. Navies and air forces exist primarily to transport troops to 

scenes of action and support them after arrival. Only land power can conclude conflicts 

decisively and thereafter occupy hostile territory if necessary. 

Maritime school. Members of the maritime school, blessed by a global reach, favor the 

teachings of venerated U.S. Navy Captain Alfred Thayer Mahan and British naval 

historian Sir Julian S. Corbett, who preached that control of high seas and littorals 

determines decisions ashore. The basic objective is to dominate critical sealanes and 

chokepoints that channel naval formations and commercial traffic afloat. Surface ships, 

submarines, and amphibious forces then can master land masses by blockades or the 

selective projection of power inland.4

Aeronautical school. The aeronautical school took shape in 1921, when Italian Brigadier 

General Giulio Douhet postulated that airpower unaided can be decisive; that given free 

rein, airpower could make protracted combat obsolete; and that control of the air and 

destruction of enemy warmaking potential, primarily population centers and industrial 

bases, constitute the central aim. Airpower proponents practiced what they preached with 
carpet bombing campaigns during World War II. Douhet's disciple Curtis E. LeMay later 

advocated bombing Vietnam "back to the Stone Age." 5

Special Operations school. Flamboyant Army Major General William "Wild Bill" 

Donovan, who founded and led the Office of Strategic Services during World War II,6

fathered the U.S. Special Operations school. He promoted small land, sea, and air teams 

prepared to perform overt, covert, and clandestine missions that orthodox armed forces 

could not accomplish as well, if at all. Adherents of this school, which mingles force with 

fraud and finesse, offer decisionmakers scalpels rather than sledgehammers for deterrent 

and warfighting purposes. 

Astronautical school. There is no military spacepower school of thought, no Beacon on 

the Hill that beams to true believers. Whosoever devises a spacepower school of thought 

to complement land, sea, air, and special operations schools deserves top billing in the 

mythical Military Spacepower Hall of Fame. 

Characteristics of a Military Spacepower Champion 

Military spacepower's champion must be a tenacious, brainy visionary who also is a 

super salesperson. Charismatic Wernher von Braun, who had a grandiose dream that he 

pursued relentlessly, might make a hard-to-beat role model. He thought big after reading 

science fiction novels authored by Jules Verne and H.G. Wells plus the theoretical 

writings of Hermann Oberth, whose 1923 opus entitled Die Rakete zu den 

Planetenräumen (By Rocket to Space) was inspirational. Von Braun championed rocket 

development and space exploration between the 1930s and the 1970s and, in that process, 

opened up whole new worlds.7

Mining the Minds of Old Masters 

Land, sea, and air schools of thought disregard or downplay interdependencies and 

benefits obtainable only from well-orchestrated joint and combined operations. Only the 

special operations school addresses the complete conflict spectrum, including complex 

problems that al Qaeda and other franchises generate during the global war against 

terrorism, which could persist for generations. 

Military spacepower architects consequently would be well advised to retain the best and 

reject the rest. They might best begin by cherry-picking the minds of land power, 

seapower, airpower, and special operations masters whose legacies include numerous 

intellectual jewels. Carl von Clausewitz, for example, reminds readers that armed forces 

primarily serve political purposes.8 British visionary Basil H. Liddell Hart's writings 

could help theorists fit military spacepower into U.S. grand strategies that meld force and 

threats of force with diplomacy, economic pressures, psychological operations, 

subterfuge, and other imaginative means to achieve national security objectives under all 

conditions.9 Alfred Thayer Mahan's contention that enemies "must be kept not only out of 

our ports, but far away from our coasts" because the welfare of the whole country 

depends on trade and commerce perhaps applies equally well to circumterrestrial space.10 
U.S. Military Spacepower Responsibilities 

Congress, using Title 10, United States Code (USC) as a vehicle, assigns broad, 

enduring roles to our Army, Navy, and Air Force. That document enjoins each to prepare 

for prompt and sustained combat operations on land, at sea, or in the air, respectively. 

Primary responsibilities of the Marine Corps, within the Department of the Navy, feature 

the seizure or defense of advanced naval bases, amphibious operations, and combat 

ashore to promote naval campaigns. Title 10 additionally prescribes 10 "activities" (roles) 

for U.S. Special Operations Command, which possesses responsibilities similar to those 

of a military service. Title 14, USC specifies Coast Guard tasks. No comparable 

instructions establish a U.S. Space Force. 

The President of the United States and Secretary of Defense assign space-related 

functions that supplement statutory roles. DOD Directive 5100.1,the pertinent document, 

directs the Army, Navy, and Air Force respectively to organize, equip, train, and provide 

service-peculiar space forces; develop service-peculiar space tactics, techniques, and 

equipment; conduct service-peculiar individual and unit space training; and participate in 

joint space operations, training, and exercises (see table 18–1). 

Table 18–1. Typical Military Functions

Sketchy responsibilities listed in Title 10 and DOD Directive 5100.1 afford flimsy 

starting points for comprehensive, integrated military spacepower concepts, but 
corrective actions remain remote. Intellectual trendsetters who specialize in space 

therefore must generate a good deal of guidance on their own initiative.

Military Spacepower Concepts 

H.G. Wells' imaginative War of the Worlds, George Lucas's "Star Wars" trilogy, and G. 

Harry Stine's Confrontation in Space11 stimulate surprisingly few enthusiasts for military 

spacepower. Conceptual progress thus remains glacially slow 50 years after tiny Sputnik, 

the first manmade space satellite, flew in 1957. Creative thinkers who also are crack 

salesmen accordingly should accelerate activities and broaden their visions to embrace 

armed combat as well as assorted support activities, which currently predominate. There 

are at least two strong incentives for doing so at an accelerated pace. 

Shortly before its demise, the Soviet Union put low-altitude U.S. satellites in potential 

peril with the world's first operational antisatellite (ASAT) system, a ground-based 

orbital platform armed with pellets. According to DOD, "Several interceptors could be 

launched each day from each of [two] pads. . . . engagement during the first orbit [would 

leave] little time for a target satellite to take evasive action."12 Russia, whose relations 

with the United States currently are dicey, could easily perfect and deploy improved 

models able to penetrate much deeper space. 

The People's Republic of China electrified the world on January 11, 2007, when it 

destroyed its obsolescent Fengyun-1 weather satellite with a test-fired direct-ascent 

ASAT, an action that fits neatly into Beijing's cosmopolitan space strategy. One 

commentator recently speculated that "a cycle of Chinese challenge and American 

response could come to dominate the bilateral relationship."13

Hoping for the best while preparing for the worst makes practical sense in those 

situations. President George Washington, in his first annual message to Congress on 

January 8, 1790, in fact advised that "to be prepared for war is one of the most effectual 

means of preserving peace."

Relevant Interests and Objectives

A clear and sustained sense of purpose in the White House, the Department of Defense, 

and the Department of State is imperative. National security interests such as survival, 

security, peace, prosperity, and freedom of action typify compelling wants and needs. 

Implementing objectives indicate what space forces must do to attain those ends under 

worst-case circumstances. Goals that feature nonprovocation might foster peace, whereas 

those that strive to control circumterrestrial space would mesh better with interests in 

military power. Most importantly, objectives on Earth and in space must be 

complementary to prevent perilous gaps and incompatibilities. Determination to protect 

Earth-bound command, control, communications, and intelligence (C3I) chains, for 

example, but not the fragile space satellites upon which they depend, would dangerously 

weaken the entire apparatus.
Operational Priorities 

The principle of war called mass contains an important message for creative thinkers who 

strive to create superlative concepts for U.S. space forces: concentrate strengths on vital 

objectives. Airpower proponents, who grasped the full significance of that notion, long 

ago assigned top priority to air superiority, because strategic bombing, battlefield 

interdiction, close air support, reconnaissance, transportation, and C3I missions are 

unlikely or infeasible if rivals rule the air. 

U.S. space forces currently depend on a few immobile Earth-based installations that 

launch, recover, control the activities of, and receive output from most spacecraft. All are 

vulnerable to missile attacks and sabotage. The survival of U.S. communications, 

intelligence collection, weather, and navigation satellites are now or soon could be 

similarly at stake if Russia, China, or both deploy sizable ASAT systems, which are 

technologically feasible in each case. "Soft kill" effects from electromagnetic pulse 

attendant to nuclear blasts in space and enhanced charged particle flux could be just as 

deadly as physically damaging weapons.14 Top-level U.S. decisionmakers consequently 

should soon ascertain whether protection for supersensitive targets should become the 

priority mission before, rather than after, the first crisis occurs.

Space-related Arms Control 

Quantitative and qualitative arms races not only deplete resources, talents, and energies, 

but also guarantee ever-greater violence if armed conflicts erupt. Proficient arms 

controllers therefore advance assorted alternatives designed to discourage military oneupmanship without undermining required capabilities.

Arms Control Aims 

Spacepower arms controllers, like those whose efforts focus on Earth and its atmospheric 

envelope, aim to verifiably limit numbers, types, technological characteristics, locations, 

and uses of armaments and stockpiled munitions. Successes foster the following strategic 

objectives:

• military imbalances 

• enhance defensive capabilities

• or alleviate international tensions

• improve threat predictions

• forestall accidental conflicts

• reduce risk of surprise attacks

• minimize damage and casualties if deterrence fails

• or contain costly escalation

• preserve selected environments.

Altruistic Treaties 
Political cooperation, the most widely professed interest in space, conforms with the 

United Nations Charter, which seeks "peaceful and friendly" international relations 

everywhere. Article II of the Outer Space Treaty of 1967, in conformance with the spirit 

and letter of that prescription, disapproves of sovereignty anywhere in space. The 1979 

Moon Treaty more specifically states that "neither the surface nor the subsurface of the 

moon [or other celestial bodies within the solar system] . . . shall become the property" of 

any person, state, or other organization.15 

Cautionary Notes

Prudent strategists should treat both of the foregoing pacts cautiously, because they could 

become invalid when (not if) economic competition permeates space. Gullible U.S. arms 

controllers who inked "agreements in principle" and failed to read fine print in the past 

have been bushwhacked more than once since the Soviets unilaterally abrogated the 

nuclear test moratorium of 1958 with a spectacular series of atmospheric explosions in 

1961.16 On June 13, 2002, 6 months after giving required notice of intent, the United 

States withdrew from the 1972 U.S.-Soviet Anti-Ballistic Missile (ABM) treaty,17 which 

was incompatible with threats that developed first in hostile North Korea, then in Iran.

Some spacepower specialists, ever mindful of such developments, believe that no arms 

control is better than bad arms control. The flip side of that coin, of course, is that good 

arms control is infinitely preferable to none. U.S. negotiators who hope to avoid 

predecessors' mistakes consequently should insist that treaty texts precisely define the 

meaning of every significant word, phrase, and punctuation mark before they sign on 

dotted lines.18

Assumptions

J.C. Wylie sought a comprehensive theory that could glue all military schools of thought 

together into a whole that would equal more than the sum of its parts. Four assumptions, 

which even crusty critic General LeMay deemed "unassailable,"19 steered his search: 

• despite all efforts to prevent it, there may be war 

• the aim of war is some measure of control over the enemy 

• nobody can invariably predict the time, place, scope, intensity, course, and 

general tenor of any war 

• the ultimate determinant in war is a man on the scene with a gun.

That catalog could have included as a fifth assumption Wylie's contention that "planning 

for certitude is the greatest of all military mistakes." He admitted that no general military 

theory could "guarantee successful strategy any more than a good political theory can 

guarantee successful government," but it could "provide a stable and orderly point of 

departure from which we might proceed . . . in devising, in carrying out, and in later 

criticizing a strategy for a particular purpose."20
Military space planners currently must rely more heavily on assumptions than their land, 

sea, and air counterparts. The following five assumptions are merely illustrative; the 

positions the planner takes will drive the ultimate strategy:

• The purposes, scope, and number of powerful participants competing militarily in 

space will (not) soon multiply and intensify.

• Comprehensive military superiority in space would (not) confer indispensable, 

perhaps decisive, advantages on Earth.

• Space colonies and competition for lunar resources will (not) cause armed conflict 

within the foreseeable future.

• U.S. military spacepower will (not) indefinitely depend upon vulnerable, crucially 

important Earth-based facilities.

• Resources and the will to employ them will (not) foster U.S. military space forces 

with a wide range of capabilities within the next 25 to 50 years.

Deterrent Concepts 

Deterrence has utility across the conflict spectrum on land, at sea, in the air, and in space. 

Deterrent dynamics, unlike those of passive avoidance, feature threats, promises, or acts, 

not necessarily military in nature, that pledge punishment if deterees perform forbidden 

deeds and perhaps offer rewards if they abstain. Spacepower strategists require answers 

to three key questions: 

• Who deters whom from making what impermissible moves by what means, with 

what motivations, at what times and places, in what situations? 

• What countermoves will deterees most likely make? 

• What counter-countermoves seem advisable?21

Concepts crafted to discourage onslaughts succeed most consistently when sound 

principles guide production. There are no firm rules like Bernoullian numbers and 

Boyle's Law of Gases, but preparedness and nonprovocation are just two among a dozen 

commendable principles of deterrence that savvy strategists could apply in space.22

Preparedness

Perpetual preparedness, whose constituent parts are readiness and sustainability, 

improves prospects for peace wherever and whenever virulent threats exist, because 

nothing tempts opportunists more than opponents with their guards down. Creative 

thinkers who craft military space concepts must answer the question: "Prepare to perform 

what tasks in which specific circumstances at what levels of effort?"

Robust defenses and preemptive/retaliatory capabilities normally give trigger-happy 

aggressors reasons to relax. Preparation to surge space deployments could strengthen 

deterrence by demonstrating resolve, provided sufficient assets in reserve are ready to 

respond on short notice. Concepts might concurrently call for deployed combat forces to 

adopt more favorable orbits. Decisions to do so would demand carefully considered 
judgment calls, because sudden military buildups and repositionings in space might 

prompt foes to preempt if they feared that they were about to be attacked.

Readiness to reciprocate in kind is another deterrent notion: you assault my spacecraft, I 

assault yours. Antisatellite capabilities pose powerful disincentives according to that 

concept, provided adversaries rely heavily on vulnerable space satellites, cannot replenish 

losses quickly at acceptable costs, and want to preserve their own forces more than they 

want to repress those of rivals.23

Nonprovocation

Military postures that rivals consider dangerously provocative can cause deterrence to 

collapse just as surely as unpreparedness can. Sound concepts therefore should shun "use 

or lose" space forces that must strike first or risk ruin. Deterrent strategies must dampen 

enemy proclivities to preempt, but that is a dubious proposition because dividing lines 

between deterrence and destabilization can be indistinct. Impervious space-based 

defenses able to neutralize enemy ballistic missiles in flight, for example, could 

camouflage a first-strike strategy. Even a few nuclear weapons in such circumstances 

might permit the possessor to win without fighting (the "acme of skill" according to Sun 

Tzu circa 500 BCE24), then direct losers to disarm. Poorly shielded foes would face two 

unattractive alternatives: surrender or suicide.25

Risk reduction measures, much like those fashioned to forestall nuclear conflict on Earth, 

might promote deterrence equally well in space. Routine discussions between 

adversaries, high-level hotline consultations, and on-site inspections of launch sites, 

satellites, space stations, and lunar installations typify potentially helpful confidencebuilding techniques. Participants in those processes nevertheless would be well advised to 

guard against enemy deception and disinformation.

Offensive Concepts 

U.S. offensive spacepower concepts pioneered by Wernher von Braun and Bernard 

Schriever thus far have been confined mainly to ballistic missiles that transit space.26

Nations that lack strong offensive or counteroffensive capabilities in space eventually 

will forfeit freedom of action, perhaps when least expected, and find it difficult to deter 

armed aggression against their interests anywhere. The desirability of attacking any target 

set depends on variables that include objectives, perceived threats to their 

accomplishment, degrees of difficulty, escalation prospects, other unwelcome side 

effects, and budgetary costs. Troublesome tradeoffs inevitably arise when key 

considerations collide. 

Principles of War 

Military strategists, practitioners of operational art, and tacticians tacitly paid homage to 

principles of war many centuries before Clausewitz compiled the first formal list in an 

1812 memorandum for Prussia's Crown Prince Friedrich Wilhelm. Armies, sea services, 
and air forces in nearly every nation possess some compendium. U.S. catalogues contain 

10 that could serve space forces as well as Earth-bound colleagues: objective, offensive, 

mass, economy of force, maneuver, unity of command, security, surprise, simplicity, and 

morale.27

Not all of the foregoing principles are invariably relevant. Mass and economy of force, 

for example, compete for attention. Values vary with situations—offensive operations 

characteristically benefit from surprise, while defenders bank more on security. Some 

critics contend that principles of war possess little or no practical utility,28 and all are 

subject to interpretations, but most professionals believe that they comprise convenient 

checklists with which to appraise concepts, policies, plans, and operations. Spacepower 

specialists accordingly should modify existing lists if necessary, interpret each entry from 

their peculiar perspectives, then use the lot to evaluate risks and estimate costs before 

they knowingly violate any of them. Historical records reveal that winners by and large 

took heed of principles, whereas losers, discounting those who were clearly out of their 

league, generally did not.

Strategic Leverage Available in Space

Armed forces on our Moon theoretically would possess great strategic leverage, because 

spacecraft at the bottom of Earth's "gravity well" need tremendous energy to leave launch 

pads and climb quickly into space. Gravitational pull on our Moon is merely one-sixth as 

strong as that around Earth, so launch problems are minuscule in comparison. Occupants 

of military positions analogous to "high ground" consequently enjoy much greater 

maneuver room and freedom of action. Put simply, it is easier to drop objects down a 

well than to throw them out (see figure 18–1).29

Figure 18–1. Earth and Moon Gravity Wells

Low earth orbits, near the bottom of Earth's gravity well in terms of 

distance (60-250 miles), are more than half way up in terms of energy 

required to reach that altitude. Spacecraft velocity must be about 4.5 miles 

per second (mps) to attain LEO. A mere 2.4 mps more is enough to reach 

the top, nearly 240,000 miles higher.
Strategic Centers of Gravity 

Clausewitz defined the term strategic center of gravity as "the hub of all power and 

movement, on which everything depends. That is the point against which all energies 

should be directed."30 The Earth-Moon system contains at least two candidates. One has 

intrinsic value. The other is important solely because of position.

On Earth. Elaborate facilities that launch, control, support, and recover space vehicles 

from Earth almost certainly will constitute strategic centers of gravity far into the future. 

They are scarce, vulnerable, indispensable, and cannot be reconstituted expeditiously, and 

thus qualify as key terrain, the seizure, destruction, retention, or control of which would 

confer a decisive advantage. 

In space. Five lunar libration points may constitute strategic centers of gravity in space 

(see figure 18–2). They actually are not points at all, but three-dimensional shapes, 

perhaps configured like 10,000-mile-long kidney beans. Mathematical models and 

computer simulations indicate that spacecraft within their respective spheres could 

remain there for long periods without expending precious fuel, because gravitational 

fields of Earth and Moon are in balance. Vehicles near L4 and L5, which are least 

disturbed by the pull of our Sun and other planets, probably could loiter almost 

indefinitely, if preliminary calculations are even close to correct.31

Figure 18–2. Map. Lunar Liberation Points
The U.S. National Commission on Space in 1986 envisioned that astronauts could fit L1 

with military facilities as well as a "motel, gas station, warehouse, restaurant, and 

garage." L2 is a potentially important clandestine assembly area, since cislunar- and 

Earth-based sentinels could not see it. L3 seems suitable as a semistable staging base for 

military operations directed against Earth or spacecraft in orbit around it. Nature, 

however, hypothetically reserves the greatest advantage for libration points L4 and L5, 

which constitute presumably stable positions 60 degrees ahead of and behind our Moon 

in its orbit. Armed forces at either or both locations theoretically could dominate the 

entire Earth-Moon system, because they look down both gravity wells. Moreover, L4 and 

L5 are so large that forces lurking therein might be difficult to target. No other location is 

potentially as commanding.32 Military space strategists could modify Halford J. 

Mackinders's original Heartland Theory33 as follows, if the aforementioned postulations 

prove true: Who controls circumterrestrial space could dominate Planet Earth; who 

controls our Moon could dominate circumterrestrial space; who controls L4 and L5 could 

dominate the Earth-Moon system.

Maneuvering in Space

Most military space concepts concentrate on attack techniques that spacecraft might 

employ and disregard strike forces on our Moon that, perhaps sooner than shortsighted 

observers anticipate, could choose from the full range of offensive maneuvers in vogue 

on Earth. Envelopments from above or against flanks, turning movements that bypass 

forward defenses, and clandestine infiltrations might be most popular. 

Assaults in free space conversely need innovative concepts, because the ideas of front, 

flanks, top, bottom, and rear would depend primarily on the direction that orbiting 

sensors and weapons systems face. Complex enemy space formations called 

constellations may make axes of advance immaterial, since widely separated satellites 
point sensors and weapons omnidirectionally. Orbital mechanics and human ingenuity 

limit maneuvering spacecraft. Counterrotation ASAT systems that attack almost head-on, 

for example, would have to follow slightly different tracks than their targets, or else they 

would collide. Relationships between point A and point B remain constant on Earth, 

whereas all weapons (save those that function at the speed of light) would require long 

leads and superlative homing devices in space—enemy spacecraft 1,800 miles away, for 

example, would move 100 to 200 miles or more in the 0.02 second it would take to 

bounce a reflection off that target and for a laser beam to return.34

Surprise and Deception 

Speed (typified by directed energy weapons that strike without warning) and audacity can 

contribute to surprise. Earth-to-geosynchronous ASATs rarely will surprise opponents, 

because trips will take hours until technological breakthroughs radically reduce flight 

times, but weapons already in space could attack high-value targets without warning, if 

burn times were brief.35

Sun Tzu, the first well-known military strategist, professed that all warfare is based on 

deception,36 which might abet surprise in space, even though sensors can spot potential 

enemies at great distances in every direction. Vacuum makes it hard to discriminate 

between missile warheads and lightweight decoys, because the latter flutter in telltale 

fashion only after they enter Earth's atmosphere, where objects with low mass-to-area 

ratios lag behind heavier objects. Spoofers in space, like those on this planet, would find 

it easy to flood rival receivers with bogus messages, so recipients would be hard pressed 

to separate bona fide communications from bogus traffic.

Civilian "fronts" for military space activities likely will become more common. Prewar 

proof of fraudulence will be elusive, in much the same way that nuclear reactors 

sometimes fool seasoned inspectors whose mission is to confirm or deny peaceful 

purposes as opposed to weapons production. Fakers might deploy widely separated 

weapons components in space and then assemble them unexpectedly.

Defensive Concepts 

What, where, and how to defend are fundamental policy decisions. Previously identified 

strategic centers of gravity on Earth and in space clearly demand the least porous 

protection obtainable. Values, vulnerabilities, likelihoods of attack, implications of loss, 

and replacement problems determine what other spacepower assets deserve safeguards:

• Missions and financial costs determine relative values.

• Estimated enemy capabilities determine relative vulnerabilities.

• Estimated enemy intentions determine likelihoods of attack.

• Strategic, operational, and tactical plans determine implications of loss.

• Ready reserves and production capacities determine reconstitution times. 
Savvy space defenders could use those five factors to prioritize problems and devise 

strategic and tactical schemes to reduce detection by enemy sensors, defeat attacks, and 

reduce damage.

Ballistic Missile Defense 

Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev on August 26, 1957, boasted about the successful launch 

of a "super-long-distance intercontinental multistage ballistic missile . . . [which] flew at 

a very high, unprecedented altitude . . . [and] landed in the target area."37 That test 

accelerated previously lackadaisical U.S. ballistic missile defense (BMD) efforts, 

although the first Soviet intercontinental ballistic missiles did not enter active service 

until 1960. U.S. brainstormers first conceived Project Defender, which envisioned spacebased interceptors long before implementing technologies became available.Progress 

peaked with Sentinel and Safeguard programs, and then languished after the Senate 

ratified the ABM Treaty in August 1972. The sole U.S. operational site at Grand Forks, 

North Dakota, shut down in 1975, but President Reagan's so-called Star Wars speech on 

March 23, 1983, revived efforts to make strategic nuclear missiles "impotent and 

obsolete."38 Belligerent North Korean president Kim Jong Il currently keeps BMD on 

U.S. front burners. 

Land, sea, and air components have long played prominent BMD roles, but space-based 

contributions remain confined to early warning and communications. Fifty years after 

Khrushchev's announcement, the best available U.S. ballistic missile interceptors still 

leave a lot to be desired, even against mediocre opposition. Room for improvement thus 

remains immense.39

Active Defense in Space 

Defensive problems on our Moon parallel those that defenders must solve on Earth, 

whereas the stealthiest craft in free space will remain somewhat easier to track than 

aircraft until advanced technologies not yet on drawing boards become available. Most, 

moreover, must fly predictable orbits at predictable speeds. The amount of thrust needed 

to change orientations significantly demands large expenditures of strictly limited 

onboard fuel.

Limit. Thin-skinned space vehicles, their optics, and their electronics are vulnerable to 

directed energy weapons (lasers, particle beams), kinetic energy weapons (Brilliant 

Pebbles, railguns, smart rocks), induced nuclear effects, and assorted other explosives. 

Hardening is possible, but only at the expense of mass, which causes costs to skyrocket. 

Even slight wiggling could diffuse particle beams that, unlike laser burns, easily penetrate 

the hardest shells. Survivability nevertheless will be poor until technologists and 

tacticians devise damage limitation measures much better than those now available.

The outlook for abilities to defend against electronic attacks is somewhat better. 

Encryption and deception could be a cost-effective way to limit enemy attempts to spoof. 

Extremely high frequencies (EHF) could reduce nuclear scintillation and absorption from 
minutes to seconds. Enemy jammers have to remain in the line of sight between 

transmitters and receivers, because EHF transmission beams are narrow. Outlays for 

high-tech defensive hardware acquired for such purposes, however, would be large. High 

price tags also would accompany programs to cope with electromagnetic pulse that 

nuclear detonations in space would induce. The acquisition, installation, operation, and 

maintenance of Faraday cages, filters, surge arresters, waveguide cutoffs, fiber optic 

links, and other sophisticated devices would merely scratch the surface.40

Limit consequences. Enemy assaults are sure to damage or destroy some crucially 

important targets, because perfect defenses are infeasible. Therefore, steps to limit 

consequences are essential. One way is to reduce target values. Many simple, singlemission, relatively inexpensive unmanned spacecraft, for example, would be preferable to 

a few supersophisticated but highly vulnerable budget-busters that serve similar purposes. 

Largely autonomous space vehicles able to perform most functions well without external 

instructions or support would make command and control centers on Earth and the Moon 

less lucrative targets. Redundant deployments and reconstitution capabilities could reduce 

the value of individual targets. The former would furnish immediately available backup. 

The latter would facilitate short-notice surges and simplify expeditious replacements.41

Impediments to Military Spacepower 

U.S. military space forces currently perform unique reconnaissance, surveillance, target 

acquisition, tracking, communications, navigational, meteorological, missile warning, 

and verification missions. Additional offensive and defensive contributions are currently 

feasible or conceivable, but military spacepower capabilities unfortunately will improve 

and expand at a snail's pace as long as technological complexities, astronomical costs, 

and impotent constituencies impede imperative progress.

Technological Complexities

Technological complexities associated with space operations currently dwarf those that 

plague the Defense Department's most complicated land, sea-, and airpower programs. 

Three cases nevertheless confirm that a competent whip-cracker, given high Presidential 

priorities, congressional support, and approval by the American people, could quickly 

and cost-effectively cut technological Gordian knots by welding individualistic 

innovators into a team and focusing their efforts until the mission is complete.

Manhattan Project. The Manhattan Project produced the world's first nuclear weapons 

less than 3 years after Brigadier General Leslie Groves, USA, took charge in 1942. 

Despite the mind-boggling needs to split atoms, develop critical masses, and create 

controlled chain reactions, scientists devised Little Boy, a uranium gun-type bomb, and 

Fat Man, a more complicated and powerful plutonium implosion weapon, and then linked 

those huge munitions with suitable delivery vehicles. A 19-kiloton Trinity test atop a 

tower near Alamogordo, New Mexico, ushered in the nuclear age shortly after daybreak 

on July 16, 1945. Little Boy and the untested Fat Man obliterated Hiroshima and 

Nagasaki respectively on August 6 and 9.42 Japan almost immediately capitulated. 
Polaris submarines. The U.S. Navy, with Rear Admiral William F. Raborn as program 

manager, expeditiously designed, developed, and tested Polaris submarines and 

submarine-launched ballistic missiles (SLBMs) 20 years after the Manhattan Project. 

That task involved at least five technological breakthroughs in breathtaking time: a 

nuclear propulsion system; an innovative navigation system; small nuclear warheads; 

solid fuel missile propellant; and an inertial guidance system suitable for SLBMs. 

Participants then deployed 41 boats within one decade (1957–1967)43 that clearly were 

the world's best and remained so for several years.

Mercury, Gemini, and Apollo. Cosmonaut Yuri Gagarin, the first human being in space, 

circled this planet aboard Vostok I on April 12, 1961. U.S. astronauts thereafter left 

Soviet competitors in the lurch with astonishing speed beginning the very next month, 

when a Redstone rocket boosted Mercury capsule Freedom Seven 116 statute miles above 

Earth on a 15-minute, 28-second suborbital flight with Alan Shepard aboard. He barely 

had time to crow, "What a beautiful view!" before splashdown. Three weeks later, on 

May 25, 1961, President John F. Kennedy told Congress, "I believe that this nation 

should commit itself to achieving the goal, before this decade is out, of landing a man on 

the moon and returning him safely to the earth."44

NASA's team successfully completed 5 more Mercury, 10 Gemini, and 10 Apollo flights, 

then put not one but two men on the Moon. Meanwhile, a third loitered above after 

stacking a command module, service module, and lunar excursion module atop a Saturn 

V launch vehicle, the most powerful any nation ever built before or since (Energiya, a 

Soviet rocket that flew only twice, came closest in 1987–1988). Two prime movers kept 

progress on track: George Low, NASA Chief of Manned Space Flight, and NASA 

Administrator James E. Webb.45

Space exploration became a backwater soon thereafter, victimized by official disinterest 

and shrinking budgets that forced NASA to disband much of its marvelous team, which 

could have set the stage for military space capabilities. Infrequent shuttle flights and 

activities aboard a small international space station have been the only manned missions 

since Skylab's three-man crews briefly orbited Earth in the 1970s. Outposts on the Moon 

and other predicted spectacular outcomes remain conspicuously absent.

Astronomical Costs 

Research, development, procurement, operational, and maintenance funds sufficient to 

deploy full-spectrum military space capabilities currently would strain DOD's budget to 

the breaking point, even if U.S. Armed Forces withdrew from Iraq today, rogue nations 

like North Korea and Iran no longer threatened U.S. national security interests, and the 

global war on terror ceased. Exploiting natural resources and manufacturing bulky items 

on the Moon rather than boosting heavy cargoes into space would cut costs by orders of 

magnitude, but those options apparently remain far in the future.46 Meanwhile, most gaps 

between military spacepower concepts and reality will remain unbridgeable until 

affordable hardware and bases make pipe dreams come true.
Impotent Constituency 

The U.S. Army Signal Corps activated an aeronautical division with three men and one 

reconnaissance aircraft in 1907, soon after the first powered flight at Kitty Hawk, North 

Carolina, on December 17, 1903. Five redesignations, many mission adjustments, and 

two world wars preceded decisions to form a separate Air Force four decades later, 

because operations aloft were distinctively different from those on land and at sea.47

U.S. military space forces remain orphaned 47 years after the first military satellites 

began to orbit Earth. The U.S. Army, Navy, and Air Force will continue to grant space 

responsibilities lower priorities than they deserve until Congress creates a separate 

service with coequal status on a land-sea-air-space team and assigns fundamental roles, 

and DOD fills in blank spots with functions that cover the complete conflict spectrum 

from normal peacetime competition through the most violent conceivable combat.

Future of U.S. Military Spacepower 

President John Fitzgerald Kennedy assigned a compelling spacepower mission in 1961 

when he told NASA to put a man on the Moon and return him safely during that decade. 

The Nation cheered when three heroes accomplished that daunting task in recordbreaking time, but the White House and Congress put manned space exploration on back 

burners soon after Kennedy's one-shot mission was complete and have kept it there ever 

since.

President George W. Bush in August 2006 promulgated a new National Space Policy that 

declares that "United States national security is critically dependent upon space 

capabilities, and this dependence will grow." It enjoins the Secretary of Defense and the 

Director of National Intelligence, in consultation with the Secretary of State and other 

departments/agencies, to "employ appropriate planning, programming, and budgeting 

activities, organizational arrangements, and strategies that result in an operational force 

structure and optimized space capabilities that support the national and homeland 

security."48 That document "talks the talk" but most likely will not "walk the walk," 

because it assigns no inspirational mission that appeals to resource providers and the 

American people. Accelerated development of comprehensive military space capabilities 

therefore awaits the issuance of a Presidentially motivated mission calculated to generate 

comprehensive and sustained support, as opposed to scintillating flashes in the pan like a 

few Moon landings. 

Conclusion 

The Soviet Union, a military superpower and sworn enemy of the United States, was the 

first nation to exploit space. We quickly caught up with and then surpassed that worthy 

opponent scientifically and technologically but, 50 years later, there is no U.S. military 

spacepower school of thought, despite probabilities that future surprises could dwarf 

Sputnik's strategic significance. U.S. military spacepower concepts are still confined to 
reconnaissance, surveillance, communications, and other support activities plus ballistic 

missile defense.

Admiral J.C. Wylie's Military Strategy: A General Theory of Power Control contains 

repeated pleas for "a full bag of strategic concepts that will always provide . . . a strategy 

applicable to a particular situation assumed for the future or existing at any given 

moment."49 That thin volume additionally recommends readily available alternatives for 

employment whenever required, but venerated British strategist Basil H. Liddell Hart 

explained why resistance to a fully-fledged U.S. Space Force remains stubbornly strong 

when he wrote that "the only thing harder than getting a new idea into the military mind 

is to get an old one out."50

U.S. policymakers accordingly must massively alter existing mindsets, create a much 

better mix of offensive, defensive, and deterrent capabilities, cease excessive reliance on 

a few elaborate Earth-bound facilities that launch, control, support, and recover 

spacecraft, and replace supersensitive, costly vehicles with reliable, cost-effective 

collections. Failure to do so risks games of catch-up that may not be winnable if they 

delay imperative improvements too long. The most admirable military space concepts 

and plans, in short, would be marginally useful unless implementing personnel, materiel, 

and infrastructure are much improved. 

Recommendations for Congress 

• Enact legislation that creates a separate U.S. Space Force within the Department 

of Defense. 

• Assign fundamental responsibilities (roles) analogous to those of our Army, 

Navy, Air Force, Coast Guard, and U.S. Special Operations Command. 

• Designate an Assistant Secretary of Defense (ASD) for Spacepower, with 

responsibilities analogous to those of the ASD for Special Operations and LowIntensity Conflict.

Recommendations for DOD 

• Assign U.S. Space Force functions analogous to those of our Army, Navy, Air 

Force, Coast Guard, and U.S. Special Operations Command. 

• Designate the Joint Staff's Director of Strategic Plans and Policy to oversee the 

development of creative military spacepower theories and concepts and to 

develop implementing policies and plans. 

• Designate National Defense University (NDU) as the focal point for the 

development of creative military spacepower theories and concepts. 

• Direct NDU to establish outreach programs designed to tap top-quality talent and 

an intellectual clearinghouse designed to integrate the best obtainable ideas. 

• Designate an impartial Inspector General to inform the President of progress or 

lack thereof regarding U.S. military spacepower theories, concepts, policies, and 

plans.

• Expeditiously commence manned military space missions to break the inertia.
Notes

1. John M. Collins, "Area Analysis of the Earth-Moon System," in Military Space Forces: The Next 

50 Years, Product Number 89–578 (Washington, DC: Congressional Research Service, October 

12, 1989). 

2. J.C. Wylie, Military Strategy: A General Theory of Power Control (New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers 

University Press, 1967), 37–64.

3. Carl von Clausewitz, On War, ed. and trans. Michael Howard and Peter Paret (Princeton: 

Princeton University Press, 1976). 

4. Alfred Thayer Mahan, The Influence of Seapower Upon History, 1660–1783 (New York: Hill and 

Wang, 1969); Sir Julian Corbett, Some Principles of Maritime Strategy (Annapolis, MD: Naval 

Institute Press, 1982). Scott R. Maethnor discusses relationships between Mahan, Corbett, and 

space in A Naval Pedigree for Space Power Theory (Maxwell Air Force Base, AL: Air University, 

School of Advanced Air and Space Studies, June 2006).

5. Giulio Douhet, The Command of the Air, trans. Dino Ferrari (Washington, DC: Office of Air 

Force History, 1983). United States Strategic Bombing Survey (New York: Garland Publishing, 

1976); Curtis E. LeMay, Mission with LeMay: My Story (New York: Doubleday, 1965), 565. 

6. Patrick K. O'Donnell, Operatives, Spies, and Saboteurs: The Unknown Story of the Men and 

Women of World War II's OSS (New York: Simon and Schuster, 2004). 

7. Bob Ward, Dr. Space: The Life of Wernher von Braun (Annapolis, MD: Naval Institute Press, 

2005).

8. Clausewitz, 87–88.

9. Basil H. Liddell Hart, Strategy (New York: Frederick A. Praeger, 1967), chapter 22, "Grand 

Strategy," 366–372. John M. Collins explains how grand strategies fit into the strategic hierarchy 

in Military Strategy: Principles, Practices, and Historical Perspectives (Dulles, VA: Brassey's, 

2002), 3–9. 

10. Mahan, 75.

11. H.G. Wells, War of the Worlds, afterword by Isaac Asimov (New York: Signet Classic, 1986); 

Star Wars Trilogy, directed by George Lucas; G. Harry Stine, Confrontation in Space (Englewood 

Cliffs, NJ: Prentice Hall, 1981). 

12. Soviet Military Power: An Assessment of the Threat, 1988 (Washington, DC: Department of 

Defense, April 1988), 64–65. 

13. James Holmes, "Beijing's Dark Designs," The Washington Times, February 12, 2007, A19; 

Richard P. Suttmeier, and Denis Fred Simon, "China's 15-Year Science and Technology Plan," 

Physics Today (December 2006), 38–43.

14. Daniel G. Dupont, "Nuclear Explosions in Orbit," Scientific American (June 2004), 100–107; 

Samuel Glasstone and Philip J. Dolan, eds., The Effects of Nuclear Weapons, 3d ed. (Washington, 

DC: Department of Defense and Department of Energy, 1977), 522–540.

15. Bhupendra Jasani, ed., Space Weapons and International Security (Oxford, UK: Oxford 

University Press, 1987), 312–315, 322–327.

16. Nathan F. Twining, Neither Liberty nor Safety: A Hard Look at U.S. Military Policy and Strategy

(New York: Holt, Rinehart and Winston, 1966), 136–139.

17. Jasani, 312–315, 322–327; "ABM Treaty Fact Sheet" (Washington, DC: The White House, 

December 13, 2001). 

18. Fred Charles Ikle, How Nations Negotiate (New York: Harper and Row, 1944), 238–253; Igor 

Lucas, "Managing U.S.-Soviet Arms Control Initiatives: Do We Speak the Same Language?" 

Comparative Strategy 6, no. 2 (1987), 164–184.

19. Curtis E. LeMay with Dale O. Smith, America Is in Danger (New York: Funk and Wagnalls, 

1968), 294–299, quotation on 294.

20. Ibid., vi, 77–86.

21. The Nature of General War, HI–1537–BN (Croton-on-Hudson, NY: Hudson Institute, November 

5, 1971), 5 (chart 2).
22. Collins, Military Strategy, 73–75.

23. Edward W. Kneller, Responsive Space Operations Architecture Study—Preliminary Results

(Fairfax, VA: National Security Space Office, April 2006).

24. Sun Tzu, The Art of War, trans. Samuel B. Griffith (New York: Oxford University Press, 1963), 

77.

25. Jack Swift, "Strategic Superiority through SDI," Defense and Foreign Affairs, December 18, 1985, 

17, 36.

26. Ward. For a summary of General Bernard Schriever's exploits, see Walter J. Boyne, "The Man 

Who Built the Missiles," Air Force (October 2000), 80–86. 

27. John I. Alger, The Quest for Victory: The History of the Principles of War (Westport, CT: 

Greenwood Press, 1982).

28. Hart, 347–350; John G. Morgan, Anthony D. McIvor, and the Secretary of the Navy's Action 

Team, "Rethinking the Principles of War," U.S. Naval Institute Proceedings (October 2003), 34–

38; Russell W. Glenn, "No More Principles of War?" Parameters 28, no. 1 (Spring 1998), 48–66.

29. Stine, 56–58, 86; Pioneering the Space Frontier: Report of the National Commission on Space

(New York: Bantam Books, 1966), 60–61.

30. Clausewitz, 595–597, 617–619. 

31. Pioneering the Space Frontier, 131–132; Gerard K. O'Neill, The High Frontier: Human Colonies 

in Space (New York: Morrow, 1977), 128–130; Roman Smoluchowski, The Solar System: The 

Sun, Planets, and Life (New York: Scientific American Library, 1983), 125.

32. W.H. Michael, Jr., "Considerations of the Motion of a Small Body in the Vicinity of the Stable 

Libration Points of the Earth-Moon System" (NASA, TR-R-160, 1963); Pioneering the Space 

Frontier, 132, 133–134.

33. Halford J. Mackinder, "The Geographical Pivot of History," Geographical Journal 23 (1904), 

421–444.

34. Ashton B. Carter, "Satellites and Antisatellites," International Security (Spring 1988), 74–75; 

Hans Mark, "Warfare in Space," in America Plans for Space (Washington, DC: National Defense 

University Press, 1986), 19–20.

35. Robert Salkeld, War and Space (Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall, 1970), 72–74; Carter, 74–

75, 82.

36. Sun Tzu, 66–67.

37. U.S. Defense Policies in 1957, House Document No. 436, 85th Congress, 2d Session (Washington, 

DC: U.S. Government Printing Office, 1958), 9.

38. United States and Soviet City Defense: Considerations for Congress, Senate Document No. 94–

208, 94th Congress, 2d Session (Washington, DC: U.S. Government Printing Office, 1976), 27–34, 

73–82; "President's Speech on Military Spending and a New Defense," The New York Times, 

March 24, 1983, 20.

39. Independent Working Group on Missile Defense, the Space Relationship, and the Twenty-first 

Century, 2007 Report (Washington, DC: Institute for Foreign Policy Analysis, 2006). 

40. Robert B. Giffen, U.S. Space System Survivability (Washington, DC: National Defense University 

Press, 1982), 35, 37; Paul B. Stares, Space and National Security (Washington, DC: The 

Brookings Institution, 198), 81–82.

41. Giffen, 36, 40, 42, 50, 51; Stares, 83.

42. Richard Rhodes, The Making of the Atom Bomb (New York: Simon and Schuster, 1995).

43. Dale Schloepflin, 41 for Freedom: The FBM Experience (New York: PublishAmerica, 2006).

44. President John Fitzgerald Kennedy, address at Rice University, May 25, 1961.

45. Charles Murray and Catherine Bly Cox, Apollo, The Race to the Moon (New York: Touchstone, 

Simon and Schuster, 1989).

46. Gregg E. Maryniak, "Living Off the Land—The Use of Resources in Space," in America Plans for 

Space (Washington, DC: National Defense University Press, 1986).

47. "An Air Force Almanac," Air Force (May 1988), 79; United States Air Force Statistical Digest, 

1948, vol. 1, 2, and vol. 2, 20.

48. U.S. National Space Policy, August 31, 2006; Marc Kaufman, "Bush Sets Defense as Space 

Priority," The Washington Post, October 18, 2006, A1, A14; for opposing views, see Theresa 

Hitchens, Space Power: Perceptions, Politics, and Posture (Washington, DC: Center for Defense 

Information, August 18, 2000).
49. J.C. Wylie, Military Strategy, 84.

50. Basil H. Liddell Hart, Thoughts on War (London: Faber and Faber, 1944), 115.
Chapter 19:

Increasing the Military Uses of Space

Everett C. Dolman and Henry F. Cooper, Jr.

America's reliance on space is so extensive that a widespread loss of space capabilities 

would prove disastrous for both its military security and its civilian welfare. The Armed 

Forces would be obliged to hunker down in a defensive crouch awaiting withdrawal from 

dozens of no-longer-tenable foreign deployments. America's economy, and along with it 

the rest of the world's, would collapse. 

For these reasons, the Air Force is charged with protecting space capabilities from harm 

and ensuring reliable space operations for the foreseeable future. As a martial 

organization, the Air Force looks to military means to achieve these assigned ends—as 

well it should. The military means it seeks include the ability to apply force in, through, 

and from space, as well as enabling and enhancing terrestrially based forces. Is this not 

self-evident? 

Consider for a moment that the Navy has a similar charge: to ensure freedom of access to 

international waters and, when directed in times of conflict, to ensure that other states 

cannot operate there. Now imagine how the Navy might achieve these objectives if it 

were denied the use of weapons, to include shore-based weapons or those owned by other 

Services. What if it were further denied the capacity or legal power to research, develop, 

or test weapons? How effective could it be? Such restrictions would be absurd, of course. 

And yet this scenario is almost perfectly parallel with the conundrum facing the Air Force 

in space. 

In this chapter, we make the case that opposition to increasing the militarization and 

weaponization of space is a misapplied legacy of the Cold War and that dramatic policy 

shifts are necessary to free the scientific, academic, and military communities to develop 

and deploy an optimum array of space capabilities, including weapons in space, 

eventually under the control of a U.S. Space Force. 

Creating the Myth of Space Sanctuary 

During World War II—before the advent of the atomic bomb or intercontinental ballistic 

missiles (ICBMs)—the Chief of the U.S. Army Air Corps, General "Hap" Arnold, had a 

prescient view of the future: 

Someday, not too distant; there can come streaking out of somewhere (we 

won't be able to hear it, it will come so fast) some kind of gadget with an 

explosive so powerful that one projectile will be able to wipe out 

completely this city of Washington. . . . I think we will meet the attack 
alright [sic] and, of course, in the air. But I'll tell you one thing, there 

won't be a goddam pilot in the sky! That attack will be met by machines 

guided not by human brains, but by devices conjured up by human brains.1 

Within about 15 years of Arnold's comments, Soviet ICBMs armed with nuclear 

warheads did indeed have the ability to threaten Washington, but over 40 years later, 

America's ability to reliably defend itself from ICBMs remains minimal—due not to 

technology limitations but to long-standing policy and political constraints. 

To understand the passion of the current opposition to space weapons, one must look into 

the fundamental issue of the Cold War: nuclear weapons deployed at a scale to threaten 

the existence of all life on the planet. The specter of potential nuclear devastation was so 

horrendous that a neo-ideal of a world without war became a political imperative. 

Longstanding realist preference for peace through strength was stymied by the 

invulnerability of ballistic missiles traveling at suborbital velocities. Thus, America 

accepted a policy of assured and mutual destruction to deter its opponents in a horrible (if 

effective) balance of terror. This meant it became politically infeasible even to 

contemplate shooting down missiles aimed at America or its allies— especially from 

machines in space that might prove so efficient as to force an opponent to strike while it 

could, before such a system became operational. 

With the coupling of space capabilities, including the extremely important roles of force 

monitoring and treaty verification, to nuclear policy, the unique characteristics of nuclear 

weapons and warfare became interconnected with military space. This is perhaps 

understandable, if fundamentally in error, but not only did space weapons become 

anathema for missile defense, but also weapons in space for the protection of interests 

there became a forbidden topic. 

Ironically, elements of the elite scientific community in the 1950s and 1960s created the 

conditions that frustrated the second half of Arnold's vision, which called upon America's 

edge in technology to provide for the Nation's defense—because they believed reaching 

that objective was not achievable and that seeking to achieve it was not desirable. 

Perhaps because they were motivated by guilt for their complicity in bringing the nuclear 

bomb to fruition, these individuals preferred to rely solely on diplomacy and arms control 

and argued against exploiting technology, which they believed would only provoke an 

arms race. They advocated this point of view at the highest political levels—and they 

were very successful in meeting their objectives. 

Whether by design or chance, the civilian leadership 40 to 50 years ago also imposed 

bureaucratic institutional constraints that limited the ability of the Services to exploit 

cutting-edge technologies to take advantage of space for traditional military purposes. 

When combined with arms control constraints and the current lack of vision among the 

military Services, this same dysfunctional space bureaucracy is simply not responsive to 

the growing threat from proliferating space technology among our adversaries as well as 

our friends. 
What World Views Should Guide Space Exploration? 

Current international relations political theory generally divides the panoply of world 

views into three broad outlooks: Wilsonian idealism or liberalism, Marxist collectivism or 

socialism, and Hobbesian realism (see figure 19–1). Arguably the most prevalent of 

these—certainly among practitioners if not academics—is the last, yet it has been 

conspicuously absent in the academic and theoretical debates concerning space 

exploration. 

Wilsonian idealism is based on the tenets of a peaceful and democratic world order as 

espoused by Woodrow Wilson. It includes the notions that law and institutions are 

important factors leading to peace and that weapons are a basic cause of war. Hence, 

prevention of space weaponization through treaties and existing international 

organizations, completely eschewing any positive role for armed force, is its key pillar of 

space exploration. Equally prominent in the history of space development—due to the 

bipolar power structure of world politics through most of its developmental stage—has 

been the position of Marxist-inspired collectivists, who insist that space should not be 

appropriated by the nations or corporations of the Earth, and that whatever bounty is 

realized there must be shared by all peoples. Collectivist efforts are generally focused on 

legal and moral arguments binding states in a system of global wealth-sharing. 

Figure 19–1. Triangulating the Space Exploitation Debate

Hobbesian realists, inspired in part by the political teachings of Thomas Hobbes, 

generally perceive the condition known as anarchy—that awful time when no higher 

power constrains the base impulses of men and states, and both survive by strength and 

wit alone—to be the underlying condition of international relations. Might indeed makes 
right to these theorists, if not morally, certainly in fact. For them, states exist in a 

perpetual condition of war. Periods between combat are best understood as preparation 

for the inevitable next conflict. The harshest view in this group is called realpolitik. 

We advocate a position far less harsh than that of Hobbes, an outlook increasingly known 

as soft realism, as we believe that proper use of military power within a framework of 

laws and rules can lead to greater security and welfare for all peoples, not just the 

wielders of that power. We do assert, however, that the state retains its position as the 

primary actor in international affairs and that violence has an indisputable and continuing 

influence on relations between states and nonstate actors. 

Still, in most academic and policy debates, the realist view has been set aside (at least 

rhetorically) as states jockey for international space leadership. Those who even question 

the blanket prohibitions on weapons or market forces in space exploration are ostracized. 

To actually advocate weaponization in space brings full condemnation. Accordingly, the 

debate has not been whether space should be weaponized, but how best to prevent the 

weaponization of space; not whether space should be developed commercially, but how 

to ensure the spoils of space are nonappropriable and distributed fairly to all. There has 

been little room for the view that state interest persists as the prime motivator in 

international relations, or that state-based capitalist exploitation of outer space would 

more efficiently reap and distribute any riches found there. It is for these reasons, we 

insist here and in several other venues, that space exploration and exploitation have been 

artificially stunted from what might have been.2 

Hence, a timely injection of realist thought may be precisely what is needed to jolt space 

exploration from its post-Apollo sluggishness. Our intent here, then, is to add the third 

point of a theoretical triangle in an arena where it had been missing, so as to center the 

debate on a true midpoint of beliefs, and not along the radical axis of two of the three 

world-views. 

The Misplaced Logic of Antiweaponization 

Opposition to the deployment of weapons in space clusters around two broad categories 

of dissent: that it cannot be done, and that it should not be done. 

Space Weapons Are Possible 

Arguments in the first category spill the most ink in opposition, but they are relatively 

easy to dispatch. Consider first that history is littered with prophesies of technical and 

scientific inadequacy, such as Lord Kelvin's famous retort, "Heavier-than-air flying 

machines are impossible." Kelvin, a leading physicist and president of the Royal Society, 

made this boast in 1895, and no less an inventor than Thomas Edison agreed. The 

possibility of spaceflight prompted even more gloomy pessimism. A New York Times 

editorial in 1921 excoriated Robert Goddard for his silly notions of rocket-propelled 

space exploration (an opinion it has since retracted): "Goddard does not know the relation 

between action and reaction and the need to have something better than a vacuum against 
which to react. He seems to lack the basic knowledge ladled out daily in high schools." 

Compounding its error in judgment, opining in 1936, the Times stated flatly, "A rocket 

will never be able to leave the Earth's atmosphere."3 

Bluntly negative scientific opinion on the possibility of space weapons writ large has 

been weeded out over time. No credible scientist today makes the claim of impossibility, 

and so less encompassing arguments are now the rule. The debate has moved to more 

subtle and scientifically sustainable arguments that a particular space weapon is not 

feasible. Mountains of mathematical formulae have been piled high in an effort, one by 

one, simply to bury the concept. But these limitations on specific systems are less due to 

theoretical analysis than to assumptions about future funding and available technology.4 

The real objection, too often hidden from view, is that a particular weapons system or 

capability cannot be developed and deployed within the planned budget or within 

narrowly specified means. When one relaxes those assumptions, opposition on technical 

grounds generally falls away. 

Furthermore, counterexamples exist—for example, the Brilliant Pebbles space-based 

interceptor system was the most advanced defense concept to emerge from the Strategic 

Defense Initiative (SDI). After a comprehensive series of technical reviews by even the 

strongest critics in 1989, it achieved major defense acquisition program status in 1990, 

was curtailed by congressional cuts in 1991 and 1992, and then was canceled by the 

Clinton administration in 1993. But the cancellation of the most advanced, least 

expensive, and most cost-effective missile defense system produced by the SDI program 

was for political, not technical, reasons.5 

The devil may very well be in the details. But when critics oppose an entire class of 

weapons based upon analyses that show particular weapons will not work, their 

arguments fail to consider the inevitable arrival of fresh concepts or new technologies 

that change all notions of current capabilities. Have we thought out the details enough to 

say categorically that no technology will allow for a viable space weapons capability? If 

so, then the argument is pat; no counter is possible. But if there are technologies or 

conditions that could allow for the successful weaponization of space, then ought we not 

argue the policy details first, lest we be swept away by a course of action that merely 

chases the technology wherever it may go? 

SpaceWeapons Should Be Deployed 

Opponents of space weapons on technical or budgetary grounds are not advocating space 

weapons in the event their current assumptions or analyses are swept aside. Rather, they 

argue that we ought not to deploy space weapons. Granted, just because a thing can be 

done does not mean it should be. But prescience is imperfect, new technologies emerge 

unpredictably, and foolish policymakers eschew adapting to them until their utility is 

beyond doubt. In anticipation of coming technologies that would make space

weaponization a most cost-effective option, moral opposition centers on six essential 

arguments. 
Space weapons are expensive; alternatives are cheaper and just as effective.This is the 

first argument against space weaponization, although it is an easy one to set aside. Of 

course space weapons are expensive—very expensive, though not necessarily more 

expensive than terrestrially based systems that may accomplish the same objectives, not 

to mention objectives that cannot be met otherwise—but so are all revolutionary 

technologies, particularly those that pioneer a new medium. Furthermore, the state that 

achieves cutting-edge military technology first has historically been the recipient of 

tremendous battlefield advantage, and so pursuit of cut-ting-edge technology continues—

despite the enormous cost. Moreover, the cultural and economic infrastructure that allows 

for and promotes innovation in the highest technologies tends to remain at the forefront 

of international influence. 

All empires decline and eventually are subsumed, but it has not been their search for the 

newest technologies or desire to stay at the forefront of innovation that causes their 

declines. Rather, it has been the policies of those states, generally an overexpansion of 

imperial control or an economic decision to freeze technologies, that result in their 

stagnation and demise. Space and space technology represent both the resources and the 

innovation that can keep a liberal and responsible American hegemony in place for 

decades, if not centuries, to come; furthermore, unless America maintains this 

technological edge, it will likely lose its preeminence. 

A follow-on argument is rhetorical and usually takes the form, "Wouldn't the money 

spent on space weapons be better spent elsewhere?" It would be lovely if the tens of 

billions of dollars necessary to effectively weaponize space could be spent on education, 

or the environment, or dozens of other worthy causes, but this is a moot argument. 

Money necessary for space weapons will not come from the Departments of the Interior 

or State or from any other department except Defense. Any windfall for not pursuing 

space weaponization is speculative only and is therefore not transitive. This means that 

the funds for space weaponization will come at the expense of other military projects, 

from within the budget of the Department of Defense. This observation is the basis for 

criticism among military traditionalists, who see the advent of space weapons as the 

beginning of the end for conventional warfare. 

Current conventional military forces and means are enough to ensure America's 

security needs, so why risk weaponization of space? The United States has the greatest 

military force the world has known; why change it when it is not broken? This argument 

is, obviously, tightly connected to the previous response, which points out that states 

failing to adapt to change eventually fall by the wayside. But more so, it shows a paucity 

of moral righteousness on the opposition's side. For the cost of deploying an effective 

space weapons program, America could buy and maintain 10 more heavy divisions (or, 

say, 6 more carrier battlegroups and 6 fighter wings). Let us suppose that is true. What 

would be more threatening to the international environment, to the sovereignty of states: 

a few hundred antiballistic missile satellites in low Earth orbit (LEO) backed by a handful 

of space lasers, or 10 heavy divisions with the support infrastructure to move and supply 

them anywhere on the globe? 
This further highlights a common ethical omission of many space weaponization 

opponents. Most insist they are not opposed to weapons per se, only to weapons in space. 

Indeed, they insist a conventional strike against a threatening state's space facility would 

be just as effective as destroying satellites in space and a whole lot cheaper and more 

reliable to boot. But what does it say about an argument that asserts weapons cannot be in 

space, where no people reside, and insists that wars there would be terrible, while at the 

same time it advocates, even encourages, such violence on Earth? Why is it that weapons 

in space are so dreadful, but the same weapons on land, on sea, and in the air are 

perfectly fine? 

Space is too vast to be controlled. If one state weaponizes, then all other states will 

follow suit, and a crippling arms race in space will ensue. Space is indeed vast, but a 

quick analysis of the fundamentals of space terrain and geography shows that control of 

just LEO would be tantamount to a global gate or checkpoint for entrance into space, a 

position that could not be flanked and would require an incredible exertion of military 

power to dislodge. Thus, the real question quickly becomes not whether the United States 

should weaponize space first, but whether it can afford to be the second to weaponize 

space. 

Space has been dubbed the ultimate high ground (see figure 19–2). As with the high 

ground throughout history, whosoever sits ensconced upon it accrues incredible benefit 

on the terrestrial battlefield. This comes from the dual advantages of enhanced span of 

command acuity (visibility and control) and kinetic power. It is simply easier and more 

powerful to shoot down the hill than up it. 

The pace of technological development, particularly in microsatellites and networked 

operations, could allow a major spacefaring state to quickly establish enough independent 

kinetic kill vehicles in LEO (through multiple payload launches) to effectively deny entry 

or transit to any other state. Currently, the United States has the infrastructure and

capacity to do so; China may in the very near future. Russia is also a potential candidate 

for a space coup. Should any one of these states put enough weapons in orbit, they could 

engage and shoot down attempts to place counterspace assets in orbit, effectively taking 

control of outer space. Indeed, the potential to be gained from ensuring spacepower 

projection while denying that capability in others is so great that some state, some day, 

will make the attempt. 

Figure 19–2. Gravitational Terrain of Earth-Moon Space
In order to ensure that no one tries, space weapons opponents argue that the best defense 

is a good example. So long as the United States does not make any effort to weaponize 

space, why would any competing state be tempted to do so? And even if another state 

does attempt it, the United States has the infrastructure to quickly follow suit and 

commence a campaign of retrieval in space. Not only does the logic escape us, but also it 

seems that by waiting, the United States is guaranteeing what space weapons opponents 

fear most: a space arms race. 

All states will oppose an American military occupation of space, and their combined 

power will accelerate the demise of the United States. There is no doubt that the United 

States will be opposed in its efforts to dominate space militarily. There will always be 

fear that any state attempting to enhance its power may use it to act capriciously, but to 

suggest that the inevitable result is a space arms competition is the worst kind of mirrorimaging. If the United States, in the very near future, were to seize space, it would do so 

in an attempt to extend its current hegemonic power. Other states may feel threatened by 

this and will certainly begrudge it, but would any be willing to bankrupt their economies 

to develop the multi-trillion-dollar infrastructure necessary to defeat the United States in 

space, all the way up the daunting gravity well of Earth? Especially after the first billions 

were spent and a weapons system was launched, if the United States showed the will to 

destroy that rocket in flight (or the laser on the ground), how long would another state be 

willing to sustain its commitment to replacing America as controller of space? 

On the other hand, any attempt by another power to seize and control space must be 

viewed as an attempt to overturn the extant international order, to replace America as the 

global hegemon. The United States, with investment already made in the necessary space 
infrastructure, would be forced to compete or cede world leadership—the latter an 

unlikely decision, one never historically taken by the reigning hegemon. The lesson is 

unambiguous; if you want an arms race in space, wait for it. 

But here is where the paradox of opposing weapons in space is most apparent. On the one

hand, we are told that if the United States weaponizes space, it will accelerate its own 

demise. The expense is too great, the ill will it fosters too encumbering, and the security 

too fleeting. Space cannot be controlled and therefore combat will occur, because to 

allow the United States to control space is tantamount to serving forever under its 

imperial thumb. Oddly, space weaponization is said to be both empowering and 

crippling—whichever argument appears most persuasive at the time. 

Weaponization of space will create conditions that will make space travel risky if not 

impossible.Having extended the illogic of opposing space weapons to the limit, 

opponents then take on the mechanics of war and the evils of the military. As for the first 

argument, orbital debris is the challenge, which the recent Chinese antisatellite (ASAT) 

test confirms. The destruction of its own dying satellite in 2007 created thousands of bits 

of debris that are now floating at orbital velocity, an expanding cloud that poses a lasting 

navigational hazard to legitimate space flight. True, the Chinese test was criminal, 

especially since it could have engaged with almost no debris remnants if it had altered its 

engagement path. In over a dozen antisatellite tests that the Soviet Union held in the 

1970s and 1980s, only the first left appreciable debris. After that, the massive co-orbital 

ASAT engaged in a kinetic direction toward the Earth, down the gravity well, causing all 

of the detritus of the ASAT and target to burn up in the atmosphere. Indeed, in a scenario 

where the United States is controlling space, most engagements would occur in launch 

phase, before the weapons even reach orbit. Any debris that is not burned up or destroyed 

will fall onto the launching state. Because tested weapons systems have maximized 

destruction to validate capabilities does not mean that future engagements must create 

long-lasting debris fields. Satellites are very fragile, and a bump or a push in the wrong 

direction is all that is necessary to send them spinning off into a useless or uncontrollable 

orbit—if you get to space first. Space war does not have to be dirty war, and in fact 

spacefaring nations will go out of their way to ensure that it is not (an argument that nonspacefaring powers may wish to fight dirty, and the only reliable defense against them 

would be in space, occurs below). 

The second argument concerns commerce and tourism. Opponents say that space 

weapons would make individuals afraid to do business in space or travel there for 

pleasure, for fear of being blown to smithereens. This is an emotional appeal that has no 

basis in fact. Currently, for example, weapons are pervasive on the seas, in the air, and on 

land, but wherever there is a dominating power, commerce and travel are secure. 

America's Navy has dominated the open oceans for the last half-century, ensuring that 

commerce is fair and free for all nations, as has its Air Force in nonterritorial airspace. A 

ship leaving port today is more likely than ever to make it to its destination, safer from 

pirates, rogue states, navigational hazards, and even weather—all due to the enforcement 

of the rule of law on the seas and the assistance of sea- and space-based navigational 

assistance. Why would American dominance in space be different? 
Space weapons advocates oppose treaties and obligations and want outer space ruled at 

the whim of whoever holds military power. This is a false argument, completely 

unsupportable. There is no dichotomy demanding law or order. Solutions lie in the most 

effective combination of law and order. There is no desire for a legal free-for-all or an 

arbitrary and capricious wielding of power by one state over all others. What we advocate 

is a new international legal regime that recognizes the lawful use of space by all nations, 

to include its commercial exploitation under appropriate rules of property and responsible 

free market values, to be enforced where necessary by the United States and its allies. 

Beyond Theory: Military Space Realities 

In 1991, U.S. forces defeated the world's fourth-largest military in just 10 days of ground 

combat. The Gulf War witnessed the public and operational debut of unfathomably 

complicated battle equipment, sleek new aircraft employing stealth technology, and 

promising new missile interceptors. Arthur C. Clarke went so far as to dub Operation 

Desert Storm the world's first space war, as none of the accomplishments of America's 

new-look military would have been possible without support from space.6 Twelve years 

later, Operation Iraqi Freedom proved that the central role of spacepower could no longer 

be denied. America's military had made the transition from a space-supported to a fully 

space-enabled force, with astonishing results. The U.S. military successfully exercised 

most of its current spacepower functions, including space lift, command and control, 

rapid battle damage assessment, meteorological support, and timing and navigation 

techniques such as Blue Force tracking, which significantly reduced incidences of 

fratricide. 

The tremendous growth in reliance on space from Desert Storm to Iraqi Freedom is 

evident in the raw numbers. The use of operational satellite communications increased 

four-fold, despite being used to support a much smaller force (fewer than 200,000 

personnel compared with more than 500,000). New operational concepts such as reach 

back (intelligence analysts in the United States sending information directly to frontline 

units) and reach forward (rear-deployed commanders able to direct battlefield operations 

in real time) reconfigured the tactical concept of war. The value of Predator and Global 

Hawk unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs), completely reliant on satellite communications 

and navigation for their operation, was confirmed. Satellite support also allowed Special 

Forces units to range across Iraq in extremely disruptive independent operations, 

practically unfettered in their silent movements. 

But the paramount effect of space-enabled warfare was in the area of combat efficiency. 

Space assets allowed all-weather, day-night precision munitions to provide the bulk of 

America's striking power. Attacks from standoff platforms, including Vietnam-era B–

52s, allowed maximum target devastation with extraordinarily low casualty rates and 

collateral damage. In Desert Storm, only 8 percent of munitions used were precisionguided, none of which were GPS-capable. By Iraqi Freedom, nearly 70 percent were 

precision-guided, more than half from GPS satellites.7 In Desert Storm, fewer than 5 

percent of aircraft were GPS-equipped. By Iraqi Freedom, all were. During Desert 

Storm, GPS proved so valuable that the Army procured and rushed into theater more than 
4,500 commercial receivers to augment the meager 800 military-band ones it could 

deploy from stockpiles, an average of 1 per company (about 200 personnel). By Iraqi 

Freedom, each Army squad (6 to 10 Soldiers) had at least 1 military GPS receiver. 

If, as it has been said, the 1990 Gulf War was the first space war—the birth of military 

enhancement and enabling space capabilities that had long gestated in the role of mission 

support—then the twin Operations Enduring Freedom and Iraqi Freedom represent 

military spacepower's coming-out party. Space support enabled a level of precision, 

stealth, command and control, intelligence-gathering, speed, maneuverability, flexibility, 

and lethality heretofore unknown. U.S. combat capabilities were absolutely dominant in 

these conflicts—and the entire world now understands the significant military role played 

by space systems. 

Unfortunately, the American military has bogged down in Phase IV operations in Iraq. 

An externally funded and supplied insurgency continues, and the death toll mounts. For 

critics of the George W. Bush administration's policies, the perceived inability of the U.S. 

Army to win this unconventional war is evidence that too much effort has been placed on 

conventional capabilities. A further argument persists that air and space forces are 

expensive luxuries that have no place in the retro-battlefield of counterterrorism. This is a

position that ignores the cultural and political realities in Iraq and confuses policy for 

military capability. 

Wherever America's ground troops engage in Iraq, they perform magnificently. In a 

nation as large as California with a population of more than 20 million, the 50,000 

combat troops in Iraq are hard pressed to be in the right place at the right time. Support 

comes significantly from space and airborne assets, which are the first line of defense in 

the war on terror. The refuge of individuals whose intention is to spread violence 

randomly and without regard to the status of noncombatants is to blend into their 

surroundings. They are found out when they move in areas that are restricted, engage in 

Internet coordination or electronic communications, purchase or move incendiary 

materials or other weapons, or gather in significant numbers. When they do, they can be 

pinpointed, but with such a small force, it takes time for Soldiers to get into position and 

engage their targets. 

Weapons in space could provide the global security needed to disrupt and counter small 

groups of terrorists wherever they operate, at the very moment they are identified. 

Currently, UAVs, dependent on space support for operations, fly persistent missions 

above areas of suspected terrorist activity in Iraq, providing real-time intelligence and, in 

some cases, onboard weapons to support ground forces in a specific area. Tactical units 

are informed of approaching hostiles, and due to all-weather and multi-spectral imaging 

systems, both friendly (Blue Force) and enemy tracking can occur throughout 

engagement operations. When ground troops are unable to respond to threatening 

situations beyond their line of sight or are unable to catch fleeing hostiles, armed UAVs 

can engage those threats. 
The other option in a large-scale counterterror operation is to bring in an overwhelming 

number of troops, enough to create a line across the entire country that can move 

forward, rousting and checking every shack and hovel, every tree and ditch, with enough 

Soldiers in reserve to prevent enemy combatants from re-infiltrating the previously 

checked zones. America could in this manner combat low-tech terrorism with low-tech 

mass military maneuvers, perhaps at a cost savings over an effective space-based 

surveillance and engagement capability (if one does not count the value of a Soldier's 

life), but we do not think dollar value is the overriding consideration in this situation. 

Terrorism in the form of limited, low-technology attacks is the most likely direct threat 

against America and its allies today, and space support is enabling the most sophisticated 

response ever seen. All-source intelligence has foiled dozens of attacks by al Qaeda and 

its associates. But what of the most dangerous threats today? Weapons of mass 

destruction, particularly nuclear but also chemical and biological ones, could be delivered 

in a variety of means vulnerable to interception if knowledge of their location is achieved 

in time for counteroperations to be effective. In situations where there is no defense 

available, or the need for one has not been anticipated, then time is the most precious 

commodity. 

A limited strike capability from space would allow for the engagement of the highest 

threat and the most fleeting targets wherever they presented themselves on the globe, 

regardless of the intention of the perpetrator. The case of a ballistic missile carrying 

nuclear warheads is exemplary. Two decades ago, the most dangerous threat facing 

America (and the world) was a massive exchange of nuclear warheads that could destroy 

all life on the planet. Since a perfect defense was not achievable, negotiators agreed to no 

defense at all, on the assumption that reasonable leaders would restrain themselves from 

global catastrophe. 

Today, a massive exchange is less likely than at any period of the Cold War, in part 

because of significant reductions in the primary nations' nuclear arsenals. The most likely 

and most dangerous threat comes from a single or limited missile launch, and from 

sources that are unlikely to be either rational or predictable. The first is an accidental 

launch, a threat we avoided making protections against due to the potentially 

destabilizing effect on the precarious Cold War balance. That an accidental launch, by 

definition undeterrable, would today hit its target is almost incomprehensible. 

More likely than an accidental launch is the intentional launch of one or a few missiles, 

either by a nonstate actor (a terrorist or "rogue boat captain" as the scenario was 

described in the early 1980s) or a rogue state attempting to maximize damage as a 

prelude to broader conflict. This is especially likely in the underdeveloped theories 

pertaining to deterring third-party states. The United States can do nothing today to 

prevent India from launching a nuclear attack against Pakistan (or vice versa) except 

threaten retaliation. If Iran should launch a nuclear missile at Israel, or in a preemptory 

strike Israel should attempt the reverse, America and the world could only sit back and 

watch, hoping that a potentially world-destroying conflict did not spin out of control. 
When President Reagan announced his desire for a missile shield in 1983, critics pointed 

out that even if a 99-percent-reliable defense from space could be achieved, a 10,000-

warhead salvo by the Soviet Union still allowed for the detonation of 100 nuclear bombs 

in American cities—and both we and the Soviets had enough missiles to make such an 

attack plausible. 

But if a single missile were launched out of the blue from deep within the Asian landmass 

today, for whatever reason, a space-based missile defense system with 99-percent 

reliability would be a godsend. And if a U.S. space defense could intercept a single Scud 

missile launched by terrorists from a ship near America's coasts before it detonated a 

nuclear warhead 100 miles up—creating an electromagnetic pulse that shuts down 

America's powergrid, halts America's banking and commerce, and reduces the battlefield 

for America's military to third world status8—it might provide for the very survival of our 

way of life. 

Looking for Leadership 

Such dire speculations call for enlightened leadership. Such a call is not new, but it is as 

yet unanswered. For example, in their February 2000 report, the co-chairmen of the 

Defense Science Board on Space Superiority wrote that: 

space superiority is absolutely essential in achieving global awareness on 

the battlefield, deterrence of potential conflict, and superior combat 

effectiveness of U.S. and Allied/Coalition military forces. . . . An essential 

part of the deterrence strategy is development of viable and visible (and 

perhaps demonstrated) capabilities to protect our space systems and to 

prevent the space capabilities being available to a potential adversary. . . . 

The Task Force recommends that improvements be made to our space 

surveillance system, higher priority and funding be placed on the 

"protection" of U.S. space systems, and that programs be started to create 

a viable and visible offensive space control capability.9 

Despite this specific call for change near the beginning of the George W. Bush 

administration, one thought to be friendly to the idea of militarizing space, any move 

toward space superiority has so far been frustrated— as has consistently been the case 

during the past 50 years, when programs critical to obtaining an effective space force ran 

into a political/policy buzzsaw, particularly when space weapons were in any way 

involved. In 1983 and 1984, for example, the Reagan administration worked hard to 

reverse the so-called Tsongas amendment that held hostage the development and testing 

of the Air Force's F–15 hit-to-kill (HTK) ASAT system to a commitment that the United 

States would enter negotiations on a comprehensive ban of all ASAT systems. Congress, 

in response to the 1982 Reagan National Space Policy (which explicitly directed 

deployment of an ASAT system), was taken with testimony and arguments about the 

dangers of militarizing space and an associated arms race, the alleged lack of a 

requirement for an ASAT system, and suggested alternatives to developing an ASAT 
capability—especially including arms control.10 A major component of the resistance 

came from members of the scientific community. 

The Reagan administration's 1984 report to Congress and the administration's many 

meetings with Senators, Representatives, and their staffs eventually carried the day, and 

the Air Force was released to test successfully its prototype system on September 13, 

1985—against a noncooperative target, which should be noted by those who claim all 

HTK tests have been against contrived targets.11 An operational F–15 fighter used its 

prototype ASAT to shoot down a dying satellite that had been on orbit for years—against 

a cold space background. And that was over 20 years ago, using 25-year-old technology, 

in a program begun in the latter days of the Ford administration and carried through the 

Carter years into Reagan's second term. 

So what happened? With fanfare about not militarizing space (responsive to criticism by 

the arms control elite and numerous nations, including the Soviet Union) and no serious 

Air Force advocacy, Congress defunded follow-on F–15 ASAT activities, and the United 

States has not built a hitto-kill ASAT, in spite of the then- (and still-) operational 

Soviet/Russian co-orbital ASAT and China's recent test of its direct-ascent ASAT.12 

The 1996 National Space Policies embed force application capabilities in euphemistic 

arms control language, for example, as discussed by Marc Berkowitz: 

[C]ritical capabilities necessary for executing space missions must be 

assured. Moreover, the policy directs that, consistent with treaty 

obligations, the U.S. will develop, operate, and maintain space control 

capabilities to ensure freedom of action in space and, if directed, deny 

such freedom of action to adversaries. Such capabilities may also be 

enhanced by diplomatic, legal, or military measures to preclude an 

adversary's hostile use of space systems and services.13 

The 2006 National Space Policy, released without fanfare on a Friday afternoon before a 

long holiday weekend, is consistent with the 1996 pol-icy—and numerous preceding 

space policy statements as well.14 Among other things, it states that "freedom of action in 

space is as important to the United States as air power and sea power"; notes that the 

exploration and use of outer space "for peaceful purposes" allows "U.S. defense and 

intelligence-related activities in pursuit of national interests"; states that "fundamental 

goals" are to "sustain the nation's leadership and ensure that space capabilities are 

available in time to further U.S. national security, homeland security and foreign policy 

objectives" and "enable U.S. operations in and through space to defend our interests 

there"; and directs the Secretary of Defense to "maintain the capabilities to execute space 

support, force enhancement, space control, and force application missions." 

While the policy certainly can be interpreted to support an agenda to fully militarize 

space, decisive leadership to do so is lacking, presumably because of the political 

impedance illustrated by the above historical examples. Even military experts seem 

inclined to shrink from advocacy of fully exploiting space for military purposes—
accepting that "space sensors are good, but space weapons are bad"—not a serious 

military perspective. Today, the Air Force contributes 90 percent of DOD's space 

personnel, 85 percent of DOD's space budget, 86 percent of DOD's space assets, and 90 

percent of DOD's space infrastructure15—yet it has no comprehensive doctrine to guide 

the Nation's exploitation of space and assure U.S. supremacy—as the 2000 Defense 

Science Board stated should be the objective of the Nation's military space programs.16 

Furthermore, the Defense establishment writ large also has taken little action to improve 

the situation, even under the leadership of former Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, 

who in 2000 led a congressionally mandated Commission to Assess the United States 

National Security Space Management and Organization, fostered by former Senator Bob 

Smith (R–NH) to challenge the status quo of U.S. military space programs and move 

toward a needed U.S. Space Force.17 The commission's unanimous bipartisan consensus 

conclusions and recommendations, which would move the Pentagon toward that desired 

objective, might have been expected to be guidelines under Secretary Rumsfeld—but, 

alas, there was little improvement on his watch. In fact, regressive steps, such as the 

disestablishment of U.S. Space Command, work in precisely the opposite direction. 

Meeting this challenge will rest with successor administrations.18 

Astropolitical Realism 

We aver that the application of space technology to military operations is simply the 

latest in a logical line of techno-innovations in the continuing process of developing 

military theory and strategy. In its narrowest construct, astropolitical realism comprises 

an extension of existing theories of global geopolitics into the vast context of the human 

conquest of outer space. In its more general and encompassing interpretation, it is the 

application of the prominent and refined realist visions of state political and military 

competition into outer space policy, particularly the development and evolution of a new 

legal and political regime that maximizes both global security and prosperity. Though 

historians have done an adequate job of describing the realist—even a harsh realpolitik—

view of humanity's tendency toward confrontational diplomatic exchange in the 

chronology of space exploration, no similar effort has been made to place a stringent 

conceptual framework around and among the many vectors of space policies and 

chronicles.19 

Thus, we propose fitting realist elements of space politics into their proper places in 

space strategy. While it may seem barbaric in this modern era to continue to assert the 

primacy of war and violence—"high politics" in the realist vernacular—in formulations 

of state strategy, it would be disingenuous and even reckless to try to deny the continued

dominance of the terrestrial state and the place of military action in the short history and 

near future of space operations. 

In the process, we advocate an open, honest debate about the future of American space 

intentions and the application of classical and emerging strategic theory to all realms of 

space exploration and exploitation— including: 
• its protection as a domain for private investment and commercialization 

• recognition of the emerging role of space as the critical, even quintessential, 

capacity for continuing American military preeminence in the international 

system 

• a thorough understanding of the astromechanical and physical properties of outer 

space essential for an optimum deployment of military space assets 

• a long-overdue development of a revamped legal and political regime based on 

current international realities and not Cold War fantasies. 

Conclusion 

With great power comes great responsibility. If the United States deploys and uses its 

military space force in concert with allies and friends to maintain effective control of 

space in a way that is perceived as tough, nonarbitrary, and efficient, adversaries would 

be discouraged from fielding opposing systems. Should the United States and its allies 

and friends use their advantage to police the heavens and allow unhindered peaceful use 

of space by any and all nations for economic and scientific development, control of low 

Earth orbit over time would be viewed as a global asset and a collective good. In much 

the same way it has maintained control of the high seas, enforcing international norms of 

innocent passage and property rights, the United States could prepare outer space for a 

long-overdue burst of economic expansion. 

There is reasonable historic support for the notion that the most peaceful and prosperous 

periods in modern history coincide with the appearance of a strong, liberal hegemon. 

America has been essentially unchallenged in its naval dominance over the last 60 years 

and in global air supremacy for the last 15 or more. Today, there is more international 

commerce on the oceans and in the air than ever. Ships and aircraft of all nations worry 

more about running into bad weather than about being commandeered by a military 

vessel or set upon by pirates. Search and rescue is a far more common task than forced 

embargo, and the transfer of humanitarian aid is a regular mission. Lest one think this era 

of cooperation is predicated on intentions rather than military stability, recall that the 

policy of open skies advocated by every President since Eisenhower did not take effect 

until after the fall of the Soviet Union and the singular rise of American power to the fore 

of international politics. The legacy of American military domination of the sea and air 

has been positive, and the same should be expected for space. 

As leader of the international community, the United States finds itself in the unenviable 

position of having to make decisions for the good of all. No matter the choice, some 

parties will benefit and others will suffer. The tragedy of American power is that it must 

make a choice, and the worst choice is to do nothing. Fortunately, the United States has a 

great advantage: its people's moral ambiguity about the use of power. There is no 

question that corrupted power is dangerous, but perhaps only Americans are so concerned 

with the possibility that they themselves will be corrupted. They fear what they could 

become. No other state has such potential for self-restraint. It is this introspection, this 

angst, that makes America the best choice to lead the world today and tomorrow. 
America is not perfect, but perhaps it is perfectible, and it is preferable to other 

alternatives that will lead if America falters at the current crossroad. 

Space weapons, along with the parallel development of information, precision, and 

stealth capabilities, represent a true revolution in military affairs. These technologies and 

capabilities will propel the world into an uncertain new age. Only a spasm of nuclear 

nihilism could curtail this future. By moving forward against the fears of the many, and 

harnessing these new technologies to a forward-looking strategy of cooperative 

advantage for all, the United States has the potential to initiate mankind's first global 

golden age. The nature of international relations and the lessons of history dictate that 

such a course begin with the vision and will of a few acting in the benefit of all. America 

must lead, for the benefit of all.

Notes

1. Quoted from Jacob Neufeld, Ballistic Missiles in the United States Air Force, 1945–1960 

(Washington, DC: Office of Air Force History, 1990), 35. 

2. See, for example, Everett Dolman and John Hickman, "Resurrecting the Space Age: A StateCentered Commentary on the Outer Space Regime," Comparative Strategy 21 (Winter 2002), 1–

45. 

3. Cited by Herbert London, "Piercing the Gloom and Doom," American Outlook (Spring 1999), 

available at <http://ao.hudson.org/index.cfm?fuseaction=article_detail&id=1270>. 

4. See, for example, Robert Preston, Dana J. Johnson, Sean J.A. Edwards, Michael D. Miller, and 

Calvin Shipbaugh, Space Weapons: Earth Wars (Santa Monica, CA: RAND Corporation, 2003). 

5. See Donald R. Baucomb, "The Rise and Fall of Brilliant Pebbles," Journal of Social, Political, 

and Economic Studies 29, no. 2 (2002), 145–190. 

6. Cited in John Burgess, "Satellites' Gaze Provides New Look at War," The Washington Post, 

February 19, 1991, A13. 

7. Testimony of Deputy Secretary of Defense Paul Wolfowitz, on U.S. Military Presence in Iraq: 

Implications for Global Defense Posture, for the House Armed Services Committee, Washington, 

DC, June 18, 2003. See also Department of Defense, Conduct of the Persian Gulf War: Final 

Report to Congress (Washington, DC: Department of Defense, April 1992), 227–228. 

8. While such a nuclear detonation would harm no one directly, the resulting electromagnetic pulse 

would wreak havoc on the U.S. powergrid, communication networks, and other critical 

infrastructure—with major national and international consequences. It could also cause significant 

upset and damage to satellite systems that are vital to U.S. terrestrial force operations and 

capabilities. See Report of the Commission to Assess the Threat to the United States from 

Electromagnetic Pulse (EMP) Attack, Executive Report, vol. I, 2004, pursuant to Public Law 201, 

104th Congress, July 15, 1998. 

9. Office of the Undersecretary of Defense for Acquisition and Technology, "Report of the Defense 

Science Board Task Force on Space Superiority," Washington, DC, February 2000. The board 

recommended that U.S. policymakers articulate two declaratory statements: "The United States 

will take all appropriate self-defense measures, including the use of force, to respond to the 

purposeful interference with U.S. or Allied space systems, or those systems critical in supporting 

national security interests"; and "The United States will take appropriate self-defense measures, 

including diplomatic and legal means as well as the flexible use of force, in response to the use of 

space by an adversary for purposes hostile to U.S. national interests." Among other things, the 

report concludes, "The use of space has become such a dominant factor in the outcome of future 

military conflict and in the protection of vital national and global interest that it should take on a 
priority and funding level similar to that which existed for U.S. strategic forces in the 1960s 

through 1980s." 

10. See "Fact Sheet Outlining United States Space Policy," July 4, 1982, Public Papers of President 

Ronald W. Reagan, Ronald Reagan Presidential Library, available at 

<www.reaganutexas.edu/archives/ speeches/1982/70482b.htm>. 

11. As argued in President Reagan's March 31, 1984, report to the Congress on U.S. Policy on ASAT 

Arms Control, such a comprehensive ban would not be verifiable and would be ineffective in 

precluding the development of a number of systems—including intercontinental ballistic missiles 

and various space systems—that would have inherent ASAT capability and, in any case, such a 

ban is not in the U.S. national security interest. President Reagan declared, "[N]o arrangements or 

agreements beyond those already governing military activities in outer space have been found to 

date that are judged to be in the overall interest of the United States or its Allies." 

12. The failure of the F–15 ASAT program, after a decade of research and development costing over 

$1.5 billion, can be traced to incoherence in program advocacy and related arms control initiatives 

during several administrations. See Henry F. Cooper, "Anti-Satellite Systems and Arms Control: 

Lessons from the Past," Strategic Review (Spring 1989), 40–48. For example, President Carter, 

while continuing the same F–15 ASAT program, proposed a comprehensive ASAT ban in 1977 in 

his first package of arms control initiatives—fortunately, the Soviets rejected it outright. 

Beginning with their 1981 UN proposal, the Soviets proposed a comprehensive ban—while 

conducting major military exercises including multiple tests of their co-orbital ASAT. The arms 

control community, including many in the scientific community, judged that the Reagan policy 

meant an end to arms control. See, for example, Paul B. Stares, The Militarization of Space: U.S. 

Policy, 1945–1984 (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University, 1985). 

13. A comprehensive discussion of the 1996 U.S. space policy is given by Marc J. Berkowitz, 

"National Space Policy and National Defense," Spacepower for the New Millennium (Colorado 

Springs: U.S. Air Force Institute for National Security Studies/McGraw-Hill, 2000), 37–59. 

14. The unclassified summary of the 2006 National Space Policy, released by the White House on 

August 31, 2006, is available at <www.ostp.gov/html/US%20National%20Space%20Policy.pdf>. 

15. Michael E. Ryan and F. Whitten Peters, The Aerospace Force: Defending America in the 21st 

Century—A White Paper on Aerospace Integration (Washington, DC: Department of the Air 

Force, May 2000), 5. 

16. For a critical review of this lack of vision, see Peter L. Hays and Karl P. Mueller, "Going 

Boldly—Where? Aerospace Integration, the Space Commission, and the Air Force's Vision for 

Space," Aerospace Power Journal (Spring 2001). 

17. The Commission's report, issued pursuant to Public Law 106–65 on January 11, 2001, is available 

at <www.defenselink.mil/pubs/space20010111.pdf>. 

18. For a discussion of these considerations, see "What Do You Leave Behind? Evaluating the Bush 

Administration's National Security Space Policy," George C. Marshall Institute Policy Outlook, 

December 2006, available at <www.marshall.org/pdf/materials/490.pdf>. 

19. See Walter McDougall's incomparable . . . the Heavens and the Earth (New York: Basic Books, 

1986). 
Chapter 20:

Preserving Freedom of Action in Space: 

Realizing the Potential and Limits of U.S. Spacepower

Michael Krepon, Theresa Hitchens, and Michael Katz-Hyman

Our working definition of spacepower is the sum total of capabilities that contribute to a 

nation's ability to benefit from the use of space. Space-power, like other types of power, 

can wax or wane depending on a country's choices and those of its potential adversaries. 

Wise national decisions can lead to cumulative increases in spacepower, but even they 

can be negated, if, for example, significant debris-increasing events in space impair 

spacepower for all nations. 

There is widespread agreement on what most of the key elements of spacepower are, but 

not all those elements are equal. Key elements would surely include possessing the 

relevant technology base, physical infrastructure, and workforce necessary to excel in 

space. Space prowess is also measured by how purposefully and successfully these 

essential elements are applied to specific missions. Many missions increase the sum total 

of a nation's capability in space. Metrics would include utilizing space for exploration 

and the advancement of knowledge; facilitating commercial transactions, resource 

planning, and terrestrial economic development; monitoring planetary health; mapping; 

providing a medium for telecommunications and broadcasting; assisting first responders, 

search and rescue operations, and disaster relief; providing early warning of 

consequential events; and utilizing space assets to enhance military and intelligence 

capabilities. The commercial, communication, and military uses of space have become 

less separable. 

Since meaning is partly defined by circumstances—and since circumstances, with respect 

to the utilization of space, are so favorable for the United States—it is understandable 

why passionate and articulate American advocates of spacepower often define this term 

in a muscular way. Many forceful advocates equate spacepower with military missions 

because U.S. forces are extraordinarily dependent on space assets that confer significant 

advantages while saving countless lives on the battlefield, and because the negation of 

these assets would be so harmful.1 

While the military uses of space are growing for the United States and other spacefaring 

nations, sweeping analogies between spacepower and terrestrial military power are 

unwise. In space, power is not accompanied by weapons—at least not yet. And in space, 

weapon-enabling technologies are widely applicable to nonmilitary pursuits. Weapon 

capabilities—or hard power—that can be utilized in space are currently confined to 

gravity-bound battlefields. In contrast, the soft power aspects of space prowess are 

unbounded, with satellites used for direct broadcasting and communication becoming 

conveyor belts for the projection of national culture and economic transactions. The long 
history of international cooperative research among civil space agencies reflects another 

element of soft space-power. Collaborative efforts such as the Apollo-Soyuz mission, the 

International Space Station, and the space shuttle attest to the utility of soft spacepower 

as a diplomatic instrument. China, an emerging spacepower, is following this welltrodden path, at least in part, by forging space cooperation agreements with nations such 

as oil-rich Venezuela and Nigeria. 

Nowhere is soft spacepower more evident than in the commercial realm, where economic 

competition is sometimes fierce but multinational cooperation is nonetheless required. 

The world relies at present on five major multinational corporations for the provision of 

global telecommunications. Global and national reliance on space assets has become 

intertwined not only for communications, but also for banking, disaster monitoring, 

weather forecasting, positioning, timing and navigation, and myriad other activities 

central to modern life. Many satellites primarily operated for commercial and civil uses 

can also serve military purposes. The use of space for commercial and economic 

development, as well as for other soft power applications, can be jeopardized if the 

deployment and use of weapons in space occur. This is because once weapons are used in 

space, their effects may not be controllable, as it is difficult to dictate strategy and tactics 

in asymmetric warfare. Consequently, weapons effects may not be limited to a small 

subset of satellites or those of a particular nation. In this sense, hard and soft spacepower 

cannot be decoupled. The misapplication of hard spacepower could therefore have 

indiscriminate effects, particularly if a destructive strike against a satellite produces 

significant and long-lasting debris. 

The misapplication of hard power on Earth could also adversely affect relations between 

major powers, friends, and allies. However, the interconnectedness of hard and soft 

spacepower means that poor decisions by one spacefaring nation are more likely to 

negatively affect all other spacefaring nations, a situation that does not arise in 

nonnuclear, terrestrial conflict. Recovery from poor decisions in space also takes far 

longer than from nonnuclear, terrestrial conflict. For example, when conventional battles 

take place on the ground, sea, and air, debris is a temporary and geographically limited 

phenomenon. Minefields can be marked or cleared, and chemical spills can be contained 

or cleaned—although this may take large amounts of both time and money. Battlefield 

debris in space, however, can last for decades, centuries, or even millennia, thereby 

constituting an indiscriminate lethal hazard to space operations. Debris generated in space 

also tends to spread to other orbits over time, and environmental cleanup technologies in 

space do not appear promising at present.2 In gravity-based warfare, the victor's spoils are 

gained through unhindered access. But such access is likely to be lost in the event that 

weapons are used in or from space, even for the "victor." 

Battlefields in space are therefore fundamentally different from those on land, at sea, or 

in the air. The potentially disabling problem of space debris is now well recognized even 

by advocates of hard spacepower. Therefore, hit-to-kill kinetic energy antisatellite 

(ASAT) weapons that have been tested occasionally constitute a significant potential 

danger to space operations, as was most evident in China's test in January 2007, which 

created the worst debris-generating event in the history of the space age.3 The earliest 
ASAT weapons—nuclear warheads atop ballistic missiles—would produce 

indiscriminate and lethal effects, as the United States learned after conducting a series of 

atmospheric nuclear tests in 1962. Nonetheless, this method of space warfare could still 

be employed. Currently, the preferred U.S. methods of using force to maintain "space 

control" entail nondestructive techniques (although U.S. officials and military leaders 

have not ruled out destructive methods). But bounding the unintended negative 

consequences of warfare in space depends on questionable assumptions, beginning with 

the dictation of rules of warfare against weaker foes. In unfair fights, however, weaker 

foes typically play by different rules. And if debris-causing space warfare hurts the 

United States severely, it is reasonable to expect that U.S. fastidiousness in engaging in 

warfare in space may not be reciprocated—as the Chinese kinetic-kill ASAT test seemed 

to indicate. 

While appreciation of soft spacepower has expanded, arguments over the military uses of 

space have actually narrowed over time. In an earlier era, there were heated debates over 

the propriety of using space for monitoring secret military activities. Beginning in the 

1970s, national technical means used to monitor nuclear forces received formal treaty 

protection. Subsequent debates focused on the propriety of using space to assist military 

operations. During the administrations of Presidents Jimmy Carter and Ronald Reagan, 

Soviet negotiators sought expansive definitions of space weapons (including the space 

shuttle) to constrain perceived U.S. military advantages in space. These negotiating 

gambits have long since lost their audience. The use of satellites to assist military 

operations on Earth is no longer controversial; instead, it has become the primary (and 

widely envied) metric of spacepower. 

While debates over spacepower and its advancement have become more narrowly drawn, 

they continue to be quite heated. Current debates focus not on the military uses of space 

but rather on its weaponization. This dividing line is admittedly not clear-cut and is 

fuzziest on the issue of jamming, when disruptive energy is applied not against satellites 

per se, but against satellite communication links. Another gray area in the spectrum 

leading from militarization to weaponization relates to lasing objects in space. 

While acknowledging gray areas (and discussing them further below), we submit that 

they do not absolve or oblige us to obliterate useful distinctions between the 

militarization and weaponization of space. It is true, for example, that long-range ballistic 

missiles that carry deadly weapons transit space en route to their targets. But ballistic 

trajectories constitute ground-based weapons aimed at ground-based targets, rather than 

being weapons based in space or aimed at space-based targets. Thus, we distinguish 

between transitory phenomena and permanent conditions. Similarly, we differentiate 

between the use of lasers for range finding, space tracking, and communication purposes, 

and the use of lasers to temporarily disable or destroy satellites. One type of activity 

provides substantial benefit while the other invites great risk. We further argue that U.S. 

national security and economic interests are advanced by working to clarify this 

distinction and by seeking the concurrence with and reinforcement of it by other key 

spacefaring nations. 
By distinguishing between the militarization and the weaponization of space, we argue 

that analogies between spacepower and other forms of military power have only limited 

utility. In other realms of military affairs, we measure power by metrics such as the 

number of weapons available, various characteristics that make them more effective, and 

their readiness for employment. Accordingly, the distinction between militarization and 

weaponization is meaningless when we discuss air, ground, and naval forces. In contrast, 

spacepower is defined at present in the absence of the deployment and use of weapons in 

space. We argue that the absence of "dedicated" space weapons is favorable to the United 

States. 

While some have compared space to another "global commons," the high seas, we 

believe this analogy to be deeply flawed. Warships provide backup for sea-based 

commerce, but they are essentially instruments of warfighting. Satellites, on the other 

hand, usually serve multiple purposes in both military and nonmilitary domains. A ship 

damaged in combat can seek safety and repairs at a friendly port. The debris from combat 

at sea sinks and rarely constitutes a lingering hazard. Defensive measures are easier to 

undertake at sea than in space. If space weapons are deployed and used, no nation can 

expect there to be safe havens in space. And if the most indiscriminate means of space 

warfare are employed, debris will become a long-lasting hazard to military and 

nonmilitary satellite operations. 

All countries would be victimized if a new precedent is set and satellites are attacked in a 

crisis or in warfare. As the preeminent space power, the United States has the most to 

lose if space were to become a shooting gallery. The best offense can serve as an 

effective defense in combat at sea, but this nostrum does not apply in space, since 

essential satellites remain extremely vulnerable to rudimentary forms of attack. The 

introduction of dedicated and deployed weapons in space by one nation would be 

followed by others that feel threatened by such actions. The first attack against a satellite 

in crisis or warfare is therefore unlikely to be a stand-alone event, and nations may 

choose different rules of engagement for space warfare and different means of attack 

once this threshold has been crossed. 

Our analysis thus leads to the conclusion that the introduction and repeated flight-testing 

of dedicated ASAT weapons would greatly subtract from U.S. spacepower, placing at 

greater risk the military, commercial, civil, and lifesaving benefits that satellites provide. 

Instead, we propose that the United States seek to avoid further flight testing of ASATs 

while hedging against hostile acts by other spacefaring nations. 

We argue that realizing the benefits of spacepower requires acknowledgment of four 

related and unavoidable dilemmas. First, the satellites upon which spacepower depends 

are extremely vulnerable. To be sure, advanced spacefaring nations can take various steps 

to reduce satellite vulnerability, but the limits of protection will surely pale beside 

available means of disruption and destruction, especially in low Earth orbit (LEO). 

Vulnerabilities can be mitigated, but not eliminated. 
Second, the dilemma of the profound vulnerability of essential satellites has been 

reinforced by another dilemma of the space age: satellites have been linked with the 

nuclear forces of major powers. Nuclear deterrence has long depended on satellites that 

provide early warning, communications, and targeting information to national command 

authorities. Even nuclear powers that do not rely on satellites for ballistic missile warning 

may still rely on them for communications, forecasting, and targeting. To interfere with 

the satellites of major powers has meant—and continues to mean—the possible use of 

nuclear weapons, since major powers could view attacks on satellites as precursors to 

attacks on their nuclear forces. 

The third dilemma of spacepower is that space disruption is far more achievable than 

space control. A strong offense might constitute the best defense on the ground, in the air, 

and at sea, but this principle holds little promise in space since a strong offense in this 

domain could still be negated by asymmetric means. Space control requires exquisitely 

correct, timely, and publicly compelling intelligence; the readiness to initiate war and to 

prevent another nation from shooting back; as well as the ability to dictate the choice of 

strategy and tactics in space. It takes great hubris to believe that even the world's sole 

superpower would be able to fulfill the requirements of space control when a $1 bag of 

marbles, properly inserted into LEO, could destroy a $1 billion satellite. The ability of the 

United States to dictate military strategy and tactics in asymmetric, gravity-bound 

warfare has proven to be challenging; it is likely to be even more challenging in space, 

where there is less margin for error. 

The fourth overarching dilemma relating to spacepower therefore rests on the realization 

that hard military power does not ensure space control, particularly if other nations make 

unwise choices and if these choices are then emulated by others. The United States has 

unparalleled agenda-setting powers, but Washington does not have the power to dictate 

or control the choices of other nations. 

These dilemmas are widely, but not universally, recognized. Together with the 

widespread public antipathy to elevating humankind's worst practices into space, they 

help explain why the flight-testing and deployment of dedicated space weapons have not 

become commonplace. These capabilities are certainly not difficult to acquire, as they are 

decades old. Indeed, tests of dedicated ASAT weapons have periodically occurred, and 

such systems were deployed for short periods during the Cold War. If the weaponization 

of space were inevitable, it surely would have occurred when the United States and the 

Soviet Union went to extraordinary lengths to compete in so many other realms. The 

weaponization of space has not occurred to date and is not inevitable in the future 

because of strong public resistence to the idea of weapons in space, and because most 

national leaders have long recognized that this would open a Pandora's box that would be 

difficult to close. 

Much has changed since the end of the Cold War, but the fundamental dilemmas of space 

control, including the linkage of satellites to nuclear deterrence among major powers, 

have not changed. The increased post– Cold War U.S. dependence on satellites makes the 

introduction of dedicated space weapons even more hazardous for national and economic 
security. Advocates of muscular space control must therefore take refuge in the fallacy of 

the last move, since warfighting plans in space make sense only in the absence of 

successful countermoves. Offensive counterforce operations in space do not come to 

grips with the dilemmas of spacepower, since proposed remedies are far more likely to 

accentuate than reduce satellite vulnerability. 

This analysis leads inexorably to a deeply unsatisfactory and yet inescapable conclusion: 

Realizing the enormous benefits of spacepower depends on recognizing the limits of 

power. The United States now enjoys unparalleled benefits from the use of space to 

advance national and economic security. These benefits would be placed at risk if 

essential zones in space become unusable as a result of warfare. Spacepower depends on 

the preservation and growth of U.S. capabilities in space. Paradoxically, the preservation 

and growth of U.S. spacepower will be undercut by the use of force in space. 

Because the use of weapons in or from space can lead to the loss or impairment of 

satellites of all major space powers, all of whom depend on satellites for military and 

economic security, we believe it is possible to craft a regime based on self-interest to 

avoid turning space into a shooting gallery. This outcome is far more difficult to achieve 

if major space powers engage in the flight-testing and deployment of dedicated ASAT 

weapons or space-to-Earth weapons. We therefore argue that it would be most unwise for 

the United States, as the spacepower with the most to lose from the impairment of its 

satellites, to initiate these steps. Similar restraint, however, needs to be exercised by other 

major spacefaring nations, some of which may feel that the preservation and growth of 

U.S. spacepower are a threat, or that it is necessary to hold U.S. space assets at risk. The 

United States is therefore obliged to clarify to others the risks of initiating actions 

harmful to U.S. satellites without prompting other spacefaring nations to take the very 

steps we seek to avoid. Consequently, a preservation and growth strategy for U.S. 

spacepower also requires a hedging strategy because, even if the United States makes 

prudent decisions in space, others may still make foolish choices. 

Hedging 

The exercise of restraint from using weapons in space is not easy for the world's most 

powerful nation or for other nations fearing catastrophic losses that they believe might be 

averted by disabling U.S. satellites. How, then, might U.S. spacepower influence the 

decisions of other nations to leave vulnerable satellites alone? 

We maintain that a prudent space posture would clarify America's ability to respond 

purposefully if another nation interferes with, disables, disrupts, or destroys U.S. 

satellites, without being the first to take the actions that we wish others to refrain from 

taking. Thus, our proposed hedging strategy would not include the flight-testing and 

deployment of dedicated ASAT or on-orbit weapons because such steps would surely be 

emulated by others and would increase risks to vital U.S. space assets. Whatever 

preparations the United States takes to hedge against attacks on its satellites must be 

calibrated to maximize freedom of action and access in space. Hedging moves that create 
an environment where the flight-testing and deployment of space weapons would be a 

common occurrence would thus be contrary to U.S. military and economic security. 

Responsible hedges by the United States include increased situational awareness, 

redundancy, and cost-effective hardening of satellites and their links. The strongest hedge 

the United States possesses is its superior conventional military capabilities, including 

long-range strike and special operations capabilities. Since an attack on a satellite can be 

considered an act of war, the United States could respond to such an attack by targeting 

the ground links and launch facilities of the offending nation or the nation that harbors a 

group carrying out such hostile acts. Far more punishing responses might be applicable. 

A hedging strategy is also likely to include ground-based research and development into 

space weapons technologies, activities that are under way in major spacefaring nations. 

The demonstration of dual- or multi-use space technologies that could be adapted, if 

needed, to respond to provocative acts would constitute another element of a responsible 

hedging strategy. Such technologies could include on-orbit rendezvous, repair, and 

refueling technologies and other proximity operations. These activities are also essential 

for expanded scientific and commercial use of space and would be key enabling 

technologies for long-duration missions such as the return to the Moon and the 

exploration of Mars. 

A prudent hedging strategy would also align U.S. military doctrine and declaratory policy 

with America's national security and economic interest in preventing weapons in space 

and ASAT tests. In the context of a proactive Air Force counterspace operations doctrine 

and official disdain for negotiations that might constrain U.S. military options in space, 

the hedging strategy we advocate might be perceived as preliminary steps toward the 

weaponization of space, which we would oppose. Wise hedging strategies would also be 

accompanied by constructive diplomatic initiatives. 

The flight-testing of multipurpose technologies, the possession of dominant power 

projection capabilities, and the growing residual U.S. military capabilities to engage in 

space warfare should provide a sufficient deterrent posture against a "space Pearl 

Harbor."4 These capabilities would also clarify that the United States possesses the means 

to defend its interests in a competition that other major space powers claim not to want, 

as well as to react in a prompt and punishing way against hostile acts against U.S. space 

assets. 

If all responsible spacefaring nations adhere to a "no further ASAT test" regime, and an 

adversary still carries out a "space Pearl Harbor" by using military capabilities designed 

for other purposes, the United States has the means to respond in kind. U.S. latent or 

residual space warfare capabilities exceed those of other spacefaring nations and are 

growing with the advent of ballistic missile defenses. We maintain that the existence of 

such capabilities constitutes another element of a hedging strategy, while providing 

further support for our contention that dedicated ASAT tests and deployments are both 

unwise and unnecessary. 
Space Preservation and Growth Strategy 

A successful hedging strategy preserves and grows U.S. spacepower. In contrast, the 

flight-testing and deployment of dedicated ASAT and on-orbit weapons produce 

conditions whereby U.S. space assets are unlikely to be available or could be gravely 

impaired when needed. Space control operations that foster the preservation and growth 

of U.S. spacepower are to be welcomed; space control operations that would have the net 

effect of placing U.S. satellites at greater risk are to be avoided. 

The U.S. Air Force's doctrine on space control operations, Counter-space Operations, 

requires the identification of adversary space assets and space-related capabilities on 

Earth. Identified targets include on-orbit satellites (including third-party assets), 

communication links, launch facilities, ground stations, and command, control, 

computers, communications, intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance (C4ISR) 

resources.5 Many of these satellites or space-related assets can be targeted using 

multipurpose conventional capabilities. For example, launch facilities and ground stations 

can be targeted by ground forces, warships, and air-power. Communication links can be 

jammed using proven systems, and elements of C4ISR can be neutralized using cyber 

attacks. Many space powers possess these capabilities to varying degrees, which may 

help explain why dedicated systems to attack satellites have rarely been flight-tested or 

deployed. 

The vulnerability of terrestrial space assets can be mitigated in a number of ways. 

Equipment can be hidden, hardened, or operated stealthily. Depending on the order of 

battle and opposing military capabilities, some assets could be protected by 

overwhelming force, and assets lost in battle can sometimes be replaced. These 

considerations are quite different in space, where force replacement is usually 

problematic and protection measures operate, at best, on the margins of economic and 

technical possibility. 

Major space powers should be adept at locating satellites in Earth orbit. Maneuvering in 

space, unlike terrestrial warfare, is usually very limited. While satellites can be placed in 

orbits that pass over regions with limited space surveillance capabilities, the nature of 

orbital mechanics dictates that, at some point, satellites will be visible to ground 

observers.6 Fuel is a more precious commodity in space due to its weight and very limited 

prospects for refueling. Maneuvering for most spacecraft is limited to normal stationkeeping operations. Moreover, satellites, unlike tanks, cannot be suitably armored for 

combat. They can be hardened to withstand some types of electromagnetic interference 

and small impacts, but it is not feasible to shield against an impact from even a marblesized debris hit, much less an intentional physical attack. Spacecraft shielding increases 

launch weight and costs by approximately $10,000 per pound.7 

Operating satellites in formations is quite different from operating aircraft carrier 

battlegroups. Valuable warships can survive direct hits of various kinds, and the debris 

from losses at sea sinks to the bottom of the ocean. In contrast, the debris from satellite 

warfare could impair constellations in space, placing at risk the orbit of the high-value 
satellites meant to be protected. Arming satellites with defensive weapons is not a 

satisfactory solution for many reasons. Unlike warships or tanks that can maneuver and 

fire many weapons, satellites have little carrying capacity beyond that required to 

perform their missions. The fundamentals of space warfare described above—including 

the difficulties in dictating tactics and the choice of weapons, as well as the consequences 

of space debris—appear immutable. The marginal cost of attack will always be less than 

the marginal cost of defense, since attacking does not necessarily require technological 

sophistication and limited attacks can cause grievous injury. 

If essential but vulnerable satellites cannot be effectively defended by space weapons, 

their protection rests largely on deterrence. When offense is too lethal to use because its 

net effect would be to harm vital national assets and interests, the default option for 

freedom of action in space is to accept mutual vulnerability. Nuclear deterrence had many 

detractors during the Cold War, even though it helped prevent nuclear exchanges 

between well-armed foes. The more power a nation possesses, the harder it is to accept 

vulnerability. But the benefits of hard and soft spacepower inescapably depend on 

satellites that are far easier to attack than to defend. 

Asymmetric capabilities and vulnerabilities in space do not negate the precepts of 

deterrence or the essence of mutual vulnerability. During the Cold War, for example, 

Beijing faced not one but two hostile superpowers and yet chose to maintain nuclear 

forces that were significantly inferior to those of the United States and the Soviet Union. 

Presumably, China's leadership concluded that relatively few mushroom clouds were 

needed to clarify superpower vulnerability. 

We argue, by analogy, that asymmetries related to dependence on space and capabilities 

in space do not alter the fundamentals of vulnerability and deterrence. The country with 

the most to lose from attacks on satellites, the United States, also has the most 

capabilities to respond with lethal force, which would be more indiscriminate because of 

the impairment or loss of its satellites. We have argued elsewhere that space warfare and 

its effects are unlikely to be country-specific. Because space warfare can be more 

indiscriminate than terrestrial warfare, and because all space-faring nations are 

increasingly dependent on space assets for national and economic security, all major 

powers face the same fundamental dilemma that satellites are both essential and 

extraordinarily vulnerable, and that the use of weapons in space is likely to have 

unintended, negative consequences. Mechanical objects may be the initial victims of 

space warfare, but satellites are unlikely to be the only victims, since they are directly 

linked to soldiers, noncombatants, and nuclear weapons. 

Nuclear deterrence was based on the repeated testing of nuclear weapons and their means 

of delivery, as well as on the deployment of many dedicated weapons systems in a high 

state of launch readiness. If we were to adopt such practices for dedicated ASAT or 

space-to-Earth weapons, satellite security would be greatly diminished, and relations 

among major powers, along with international space cooperation, would deteriorate. At 

best, a very uneasy standoff in space could result from the flight-testing and deployment 

of dedicated ASAT weapons. In our view, no further ASAT testing is required because, 
for all practical purposes, this uneasy standoff already exists. Major spacefaring nations 

have already clarified their ability to disrupt or destroy satellites. Since these capabilities 

are well understood, they do not need to be demonstrated by further testing, the net effect 

of which would be more worrisome than reassuring. 

Mutual assured destruction in space is therefore far easier to maintain than nuclear 

deterrence was during the Cold War, because mutual vulnerability from the use of 

weapons in or from space does not require repeated demonstrations of the weapons in 

question. And unlike nuclear deterrence, which had the practical effect of limiting 

freedom of action, acceptance of mutual vulnerability in space would maximize freedom 

of action and access. Despite these significant differences, there are two principal 

connecting threads between the acceptance of mutual vulnerability between major 

nuclear powers and major space powers. First, attacks on satellites in crises between 

major powers risk the use of nuclear weapons. And second, existential vulnerability to 

nuclear and satellite attacks is not solvable by military means. 

Code of Conduct 

We view a code of conduct for responsible spacefaring nations as a necessary 

complement to a hedging strategy and as an essential element of a space posture that 

provides for the preservation and growth of U.S. space capabilities. A code of conduct 

makes sense because, with the increased utilization and importance of space for national 

and economic security, there is increased need for space operators and spacefaring 

nations to act responsibly. While some rules and treaty obligations exist, there are many 

gaps in coverage, including how best to avoid collisions and harmful interference, 

appropriate uses of lasers, and notifications related to potentially dangerous maneuvers. 

Because the increased utilization of space for security and economic purposes could lead 

to friction and diminished space assurance, it serves the interests of all responsible 

spacefaring nations to establish rules of the road to help prevent misunderstandings, 

catastrophic actions in space, and grievances. 

Another reason for pursuing rules of the road is that interactive hedging strategies could 

generate actions in space that diminish space security by nations concerned about the 

import of technology demonstrations and flight tests. We have therefore argued that 

hedging strategies are best accompanied by diplomatic initiatives to set norms that 

increase the safety and security of satellites vital to U.S. national and economic security. 

A code of conduct would serve these purposes. 

No codes of conduct or rules of the road are self-enforcing. Despite traffic laws, some 

drivers still speed. But having rules of the road reduces the incidence of misbehavior and 

facilitates action against reckless drivers. We acknowledge that there are no traffic courts 

for misbehavior in space, but we nonetheless argue that having agreed rules of the road in 

this domain will also reduce the incidence of misbehavior, while facilitating the isolation 

of the miscreant as well as the application of necessary remedies. Without rules, there are 

no rule breakers. 
Traditional arms control was devised to prevent arms racing between the superpowers. 

With the demise of the Soviet Union, concerns over arms racing have been replaced by 

concerns over proliferation and nuclear terrorism. Cooperative threat reduction initiatives 

have been designed to deal with contemporary threats. These arrangements have taken 

myriad forms, including rules of the road to prevent proliferation. Since the flight-testing, 

deployment, and use of weapons in space would increase security concerns, and since 

security concerns are drivers for proliferation, agreed rules of the road for space could 

supplement other codes of conduct that seek to prevent proliferation. 

Codes of conduct supplement, but differ from, traditional arms control remedies. Skeptics 

of new arms control treaties to prevent ASAT tests and space-based weapons argue that it 

would be difficult to arrive at an agreed definition of space weapons, and that even if this 

were possible, it would be hard to monitor compliance with treaty obligations. A code of 

conduct would focus on responsible and irresponsible activities in space that, in turn, 

would obviate the need for an agreed definition of space weapons. For example, a code of 

conduct might seek to prohibit the deliberate creation of persistent space debris. Again, 

our focus is on behavior, not an agreed definition of space weapons. Moreover, the 

deliberate creation of persistent space debris is very hard to hide and can be monitored by 

existing technical means. 

The United States has championed codes of conduct governing militaries operating in 

close proximity at sea in the 1972 Incidents at Sea Agreement, as well as in the air and on 

the ground, in the 1989 Dangerous Military Practices Agreement. More recently, the 

United States has championed codes of conduct to reduce proliferation threats, including 

The Hague Code of Conduct (2002) and the Proliferation Security Initiative (2003). The 

2001 Space Commission Report chaired by Donald Rumsfeld also endorsed rules of the 

road for space.8 

Codes of conduct typically take the form of executive agreements in the United States. 

They can begin as bilateral or multilateral compacts and they can expand with subsequent 

membership. Codes of conduct are either an alternative to, or a way station toward, more 

formal treaty-based constraints that often take extended effort.9 

Some rules of the road, formal agreements, and elements of a code of conduct already 

exist for space. The foundation document that defines the responsibilities of spacefaring 

nations is the Outer Space Treaty (1967). Other key international agreements and 

institutions include the Liability Convention and the International Telecommunications 

Union. 

There is growing sentiment among space operators to develop and implement several key 

elements of a code of conduct, including improved data sharing on space situational 

awareness; debris mitigation measures; and improved space traffic management to avoid 

unintentional interference or collisions in increasingly crowded orbits. A more 

comprehensive code of conduct might include elements such as notification and 

consultation measures; provisions for special caution areas; constraints against the 

harmful use of lasers; and measures that increase the safety, and reduce the likelihood, of 
damaging actions against manmade space objects, such as harmful interference against 

satellites that create persistent space debris. Key elements of a code of conduct are useful 

individually, but they are even more useful when drawn together as a coherent regime. 

Situationa Awareness

Space situational awareness (SSA)—the ability to monitor and understand the constantly 

changing environment in space—is one of the most important factors in ensuring the 

safety and security of all operational satellites and spacecraft. SSA provides individual 

actors with the ability to monitor the health of their own assets, as well as an awareness 

of the actions of others in space. Transparency measures can be particularly helpful in 

providing early warning of troubling developments and in dampening threat perceptions. 

One measure of U.S. spacepower and space prowess is America's unparalleled space 

situational awareness capabilities. Thus, the United States is in a position to become a 

leader in building space transparency, which is the foundation stone of norm setting and 

rules of the road in space. 

Traffic Management 

The International Academy of Astronautics (IAA) "Cosmic Study on Space Traffic 

Management" defines space traffic management as: 

the set of technical and regulatory provisions for promoting safe access 

into outer space, operations in outer space and return from outer space to 

Earth free from physical or radio-frequency interference.10 

We also endorse intermediate steps toward this outcome and advocate empowering or 

creating an industry advisory group that could recommend actions and participate in the 

work of international bodies. 

Notification and Consultations 

The development of more formal processes for notification of satellite maneuvers is 

critical for ensuring space situational awareness; without such notification, satellite 

tracking and collision avoidance become much more difficult. Prelaunch notification 

could assist space surveillance as well as traffic management. Models for prelaunch 

notification could be the 2000 U.S.Russian Joint Data Exchange Center11 and the 2000 

U.S.-Russian Pre-and Post-Launch Notification Agreement.12 Elements from these 

agreements—as well as other ideas for data provision—might be studied by the United 

Nations Committee on the Peaceful Use of Outer Space's (COPUOS's) Scientific and 

Technical Subcommittee and translated into recommendations for either a voluntary 

regime or a possible multilateral accord. 

Special Caution Areas 
The IAA Cosmic Study mentions two different approaches to what the Dangerous 

Military Practices Agreement has termed special caution areas. In space, these might 

consist of provisions for safe distances or zones around satellites or more general 

"zoning" rules that restrict certain activities in certain orbital planes. Further in-depth 

study of the technical requirements and legal considerations surrounding the 

establishment of special caution areas is required before judgments can be made on the 

practicality and utility of such approaches; this is work that the IAA or other 

organizations could easily pursue. 

Debris Mitigation 

The deliberate generation of persistent space debris constitutes a hazard to space 

operations. Debris mitigation is therefore a pressing problem related to space traffic 

management. It is also the code of conduct element that has been furthest developed. The 

Inter-Agency Space Debris Coordination Committee (IADC), comprised of the space 

agencies of the world's major space powers, has developed a number of debris mitigation 

guidelines. Several nations have incorporated the agreed measures into their national laws 

and regulatory systems, and others are moving to do so. The United States is a leader in 

codifying strong debris mitigation guidelines. Thus, the United States is well placed to 

use this element of its soft spacepower to set strong international norms and work toward 

legally binding, formal international accords. 

No Harmful Use of Lasers 

There are at least two precedents for restricting the use of lasers during peacetime: the 

Prevention of Dangerous Military Activities Agreement and the Incidents at Sea 

Agreement.13 The multiple applications of lasers highlight the utility of establishing rules 

of the road that distinguish between acceptable uses—such as range-finding, 

communication, and information-gathering—and uses that could be considered acts of 

war, such as dazzling, blinding, and damaging satellites. Norms regarding laser 

power/configuration for tracking purposes might be discussed to reduce the likelihood of 

damage to satellites and to reduce miscalculation. We endorse the convening of a panel 

of technical specialists, perhaps under the auspices of the IAA, to discuss this. COPUOS 

might usefully propose procedures for dealing with laser incidents. 

Increasing Satellite Safety and Reducing the Likelihood of Satellite Damage 

A national space strategy designed to preserve and grow U.S. capabilities in space would 

benefit from steps to increase satellite safety and reduce the potential damage to satellites 

upon which that strategy rests. This would, of course, include technical protection 

measures. However, it would also entail proactive diplomatic measures to prevent 

weapons-related creation of space debris. As advocates of U.S. spacepower, we therefore 

believe it would be wise to set rules of the road against the further testing of ASATs or 

other weapons based in space that would create debris by applying energy against targets. 

The use of weapons that produce indiscriminate and long-lasting damage in ground 

combat has justifiably earned widespread opprobrium. The use of certain weapons in 
space could be doubly injurious, since they could produce indiscriminate and long-lasting 

damage in orbit that, in turn, could prompt similar damage on Earth. 

Conclusion 

We have argued that spacepower rests on a broad foundation, building upward to the 

orbital dance of satellites. We further argue that space-power is inextricably linked to, but 

different from, other forms of military power. The fundamental paradox of spacepower is 

that satellite effectiveness and vulnerability are inseparable, which makes hard power 

projection in and from space an extraordinarily risky undertaking. The preservation and 

growth of U.S. spacepower therefore requires the protection of satellites—vital assets that 

can readily be lost and quite difficult to replace in combat—by other means. We propose 

to address this dilemma through a variety of initiatives, including a hedging strategy and 

diplomatic initiatives centered on a code of conduct for responsible spacefaring nations.

Notes

1. See, for example, David E. Lupton, On Space Warfare: A Spacepower Doctrine (Maxwell Air 

Force Base, AL: Air University Press, June 1998); Colin S. Gray, "The Influence of Spacepower 

upon History," Comparative Strategy 15, no. 4 (October–December 1996), 293–308; James 

Oberg, Spacepower Theory (Washington, DC: U.S. Government Printing Office, 1999); and Air 

Force Doctrine Document 2–2, Space Operations (Maxwell Air Force Base, AL: Air Force 

Doctrine Center, November 27, 2001). 

2. J.C. Liou and N.L. Johnson, "Risks in Space from Orbiting Debris," Science 311 (January 20, 

2006), 340. 

3. Frank Morring, Jr., "Worst Ever: Chinese Anti-satellite Test Boosted Space-debris Population by 

10% in an Instant," Aviation Week and Space Technology, February 12, 2007, 20. 

4. Department of Defense, "Report of the Commission to Assess United States National Security 

Space Management and Organization" (Washington, DC: Department of Defense, 2001), 22. 

5. Air Force Doctrine Document 2.2–1, Counterspace Operations (Washington, DC: Department of 

the Air Force, August 2, 2004), 32–33. 

6. Even classified satellites, for which no orbital data is publicly available, have been tracked by 

amateur ground observers using nothing more than a camera and a stopwatch. See, for example, 

the Visual Satellite Observer's Home Page Web site at <www.satobs.org/>. 

7. Futron Corporation, "Space Transportation Costs: Trends in Price per Pound to Orbit 1990–

2000," available at 

<www.futron.com/pdf/resource_center/white_papers/FutronLaunchCostWP.pdf>. 

8. "Report of the Commission to Assess United States National Security Space Management and 

Organization," 18. 

9. For more information regarding space code of conduct approaches, see Michael Krepon and 

Christopher Clary, Space Assurance or Space Dominance: The Case Against Weaponizing Space 

(Washington, DC: The Henry L. Stimson Center, 2003), and Theresa Hitchens, Future Security in 

Space: Charting a Cooperative Course (Washington, DC: Center for Defense Information, 

September 2004). 

10. Corrine Contant-Jorgenson, Petr Lála, and Kai-Uwe Schrogl, eds., "Cosmic Study on Space 

Traffic Management" (Paris: International Academy of Astronautics, 2006), 10, available at 

<http://iaaweb.org/iaa/Studies/spacetraffic.pdf>. 
11. Peter L. Hays, "United States Military Space into the Twenty-first Century," Institute for National 

Security Studies Occasional Paper 42 (Colorado Springs: U.S. Air Force Academy, September 

2002), 115–116. 

12. U.S. Department of State Fact Sheet, "Memorandum of Understanding on Notification of Missile 

Launches," December 16, 2000, available at <www.state.gov/t/ac/trt/4954.htm>; Philipp C. Bleek, 

"U.S., Russia Sign Missile- and Space-Launch Notification Deal," Arms Control Today (January–

February 2001), available at <www.armscontrol.org/act/2001_01_02/usruslaunch.asp>; Hays, 

116. 

13. The Prevention of Dangerous Military Activities Agreement prohibits uses of lasers that might 

harm personnel or equipment; text of the agreement can be found in International Legal Materials 

28, no. 2 (1989), 877–895. The Incidents at Sea accord prohibits the illumination of the bridges of 

the other parties' ships; see "Agreement Between the Government of the United States of America 

and the Government of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics on the Prevention of Incidents on 

and over the High Seas," available at <http://dosfan.lib.uic.edu/acda/treaties/sea1.htm>. 
Chapter 21:

Balancing U.S. Security Interests in Space

Michael E. O'Hanlon

What should the United States do with its future space policy? Available options range 

from hastening to develop and deploy space weapons that could destroy ballistic missiles, 

other satellites, or ground targets, to banning the weaponization of space altogether 

through international treaty. This chapter takes a middle path, not in the interest of 

triangulation or compromise for its own sake, but because the extreme options would 

poorly serve American security interests. At some point, a clearer decision in favor of one 

end of the weaponization/arms control spectrum or the other could be appropriate. But in 

light of strategic and technological realities, this is not the time. 

Space systems were a focus of arms control debate during the Cold War, and many would 

still like outer space, the last physical frontier of the human experience, to be a sanctuary 

from military competition.1 These proponents favor binding, permanent, multilateral bans 

on space weaponry. Beyond their philosophical motivation, American opponents of the 

weaponization of space make a practical national-interest argument: as the world's 

principal space power today, the United States stands to lose the most from 

weaponization, since it could jeopardize the communications and reconnaissance systems 

on which the U.S. military and economy so disproportionately depend.2 Opponents of 

weaponizing space also point to the world's growing economic dependence on space 

assets and to the risk of damaging those assets should weaponry be based in or used 

outside of the atmosphere. 

Non-American opponents of weaponizing space also worry about a unilateralist America 

pursuing its own military advantage at the expense of other countries, most of which do 

not favor putting weapons in space. This dispute has much of its origins and motivation 

in the history of the ballistic missile defense debate, as well as in the antisatellite weapons 

debate of the 1980s. But it has taken on a new tone in what many view as an era of 

American unipolarity or hegemony. In recent years, China and Russia have been 

consistent in their opposition to the weaponization of space and in their desire for a treaty 

banning the testing, deployment, and use of weapons in space.3 So have a number of U.S. 

allies, including Canada, which proposed in 1998 that the United Nations (UN) convene a 

committee on outer space during its conference on disarmament in Geneva.4 The UN 

General Assembly passed resolutions for more than 20 straight years opposing the 

weaponization of space. 

In contrast, developing more military applications for outer space is an important 

imperative for most American defense planners today. Much thinking about the so-called 

revolution in military affairs and transformation of defense emphasizes space capabilities. 

Ensuring American military dominance in the coming years—something proponents tend 
to see as critical for global stability as well as for unilateral advantage—will require the 

United States to remain well ahead of its potential adversaries technologically. For some 

defense futurists, the key requirement will be to control space, denying its effective use to 

U.S. adversaries while preserving the unfettered operation of American satellites that 

help make up a "reconnaissance-strike complex." Others favor an even more ambitious 

approach. Given that fixed bases on land and large assets such as ships are increasingly 

vulnerable to precision-strike weaponry and other enemy capabilities—or to the political 

opposition of allies such as Turkey, Saudi Arabia, and France, which have sometimes 

opposed use of their territories or airspace for military operations (as in the 2003 war in 

Iraq and in the 1986 U.S. bombing of Libya)—these advocates favor greater U.S. reliance 

on long-range strike systems, including platforms in space.5 

Advocates of space weaponry also argue that, in effect, space is already weaponized, at 

least in subtle ways. Most medium- and long-range rockets capable of carrying nuclear 

weapons already constitute latent anti-satellite (ASAT) weapons. Likewise, rockets and 

space-launch vehicles could probably be used to launch small homing satellites equipped 

with explosives and capable of approaching and destroying another satellite. Such 

capabilities may not even require testing, or at least testing that is not easily detectable 

from Earth. Advocates of weaponization further note that the United States is willing to 

use weapons to deny other countries' wartime use of the atmosphere, the oceans, and 

land, raising the question of why space should be a sanctuary when these other realms are 

not. As Barry Watts put it, "Satellites may have owners and operators, but, in contrast to 

sailors, they do not have mothers."6 

And of course, not all countries that publicly oppose putting weapons in space are true to 

their rhetoric in practice. The People's Republic of China (PRC) is the most notable 

example, with its early 2007 ASAT test destroying an old PRC weather satellite, 

increasing low Earth orbit space debris by 10 percent and shattering an effective 

moratorium on the testing of ASAT systems that was more than two decades old. In 

fairness to Beijing, it could be argued that it had a right to "catch up" with the United 

States— not only with the ASAT technology the Pentagon had developed in the 1970s 

and 1980s, but also with latent modern ASAT capabilities in the form of American 

ballistic missile defense systems. That said, it was China and only China that ended the 

effective international moratorium on actual testing of antisatellite systems, and it was the 

PRC that chose to take actions at blatant odds with its own official negotiating position in 

international talks over space weaponry. The point of this assessment is not to vilify 

China's behavior; in fact, in many ways, such a demonstration of capability is consistent 

with how a rising power historically would be expected to handle such a situation. Its 

behavior fits squarely within the trajectory that realists at least would predict. That is true 

even if it may have reflected poor coordination and communications within the PRC 

government (since the blow to China's international image may not be offset by the 

acquisition of useful new capabilities).7 But whatever one's views on that point, China's 

ASAT test would seem to reaffirm that the United States must fashion its military space 

policy based more on a hardheaded assessment of capabilities and potential capabilities 

than on ideological positions, be they of the pro–arms control or pro–space 

weaponization variety. 
Specific military scenarios can bring these more abstract arguments into clearer focus. 

Consider just one possibility. If, in a future Taiwan Strait crisis, China could locate and 

target American aircraft carriers using satellite technology, the case for somehow 

countering those satellites through direct offensive action would be powerful. This 

decision might be made easier if China itself initiated the use of ASATs, perhaps against 

Taiwan, but it could be an option the United States would have to consider seriously even 

if China had not. If jamming or other means of temporary disruption could not be shown 

to reliably interrupt China's satellite activities, outright destruction would probably be 

seriously proposed. This scenario is investigated in greater detail below, not out of any 

conviction that the United States and China are headed for military rivalry or conflict, but 

out of the belief that such scenarios must concern American force planners as they think 

through the pros and cons of various policy options. 

No space-based missile defense or antisatellite weapons (with the possible exception of

an isolated experimental launcher or two) were deployed during the Cold War. That did 

not, however, reflect any decision to keep space forever free from weaponry. Nor do 

existing arms control treaties ban such weapons. Instead, they ban the deployment or use 

of nuclear weapons in outer space, prevent colonization of heavenly bodies for military 

purposes, and protect the rights of countries to use space to verify arms control accords 

and to conduct peaceful activities.8 In addition, in 2000, the United States and Russia 

agreed to notify each other of most space launches and ballistic missile tests in advance.9 

Most other matters are still unresolved. And the concept of space as a sanctuary will be 

more difficult to defend or justify as the advanced targeting and communications 

capabilities of space systems are increasingly used to help deliver lethal ordnance on 

target.10 

Some scholars do argue that the Strategic Arms Reduction, Interme-diate-Range Nuclear 

Forces, and Conventional Armed Forces in Europe treaties effectively ban the use of 

ASATs by one signatory of these treaties against any and all others, given the protection 

provided to satellite verification missions in the accords. But these treaties were signed 

before imaging satellites came into their own as targeting devices for tactical warfighting 

purposes, raising the legal and political question of whether a satellite originally 

protected for one generally nonprovocative and stabilizing purpose can be guaranteed 

protection when used in a more competitive fashion. Moreover, no one argues that these 

treaties ban the development, testing, production, or deployment of ASATs.11 Nor do any 

involve China. 

The United States currently conducts few space weapons activities, but that could change 

quickly. From time to time, a Pentagon official speaks of the need to be forward-leaning 

on the space weaponization issue, and periodically, the open press reports consideration 

of at least small amounts of research and development funding for dedicated antisatellite 

weapons. As best as one can tell from the outside, such programs do not appear to have 

much momentum as of now. Yet it is hard to be sure and very hard to predict the future. 

In this light, should the United States agree to restraints on future military uses of outer 

space, in particular the weaponization of outer space? Any useful formal treaties would 
have to be multilateral in scope. It makes little sense to consider bilateral treaties because 

it is unclear what country should be the other party to a treaty. At this point, any space 

treaty worth the effort to negotiate would have to include as many other space-faring 

countries as possible, ranging from Russia and the European powers to China, India, and 

Japan. To be sure, that accords would be multilateral does not mean that they should be 

negotiated at the United Nations, where many space arms control discussions have 

occurred to date. There is a strong and perhaps ideological pro–arms control bias in the 

UN Conference on Disarmament, where these discussions have taken place. In addition, 

some countries may be using those fora to score political points against the United States 

rather than to genuinely pursue long-term accords for promoting international stability. 

The United Nations might ultimately be involved to bless any treaty, but it might be best 

to negotiate elsewhere. 

On the other hand, should the United States accelerate any space weaponization 

programs? Here again, my conclusion is one of caution. Although opposed to most types 

of binding arms control (which would deprive the United States of options that may 

someday be necessary), I do not believe that the United States would benefit from 

exercising most of those options at present. Some additional capabilities, such as 

improved space situational awareness, make sense, as do more hardening for key 

satellites and more redundancy in communications and reconnaissance systems. But 

weapons, at present, do not make sense—with the exception of certain ballistic missile 

defense capabilities designed for a different purpose (even if they admittedly often have 

some inherent ASAT potential). 

Before going into these issues in more detail, it is useful to provide clear strategic and 

military context to the discussion with a fuller examination of what a space-related 

military contingency could entail in the future. It is along these lines that a China scenario 

merits further study. 

Scenario: Possible War Against China Over Taiwan 

Given trends in military reconnaissance, information processing, and precision-strike 

technologies, large assets (such as aircraft carriers and land bases) on which the United 

States depends are likely to be increasingly vulnerable to attack in the years ahead. Land 

bases can to an extent be protected, hardened, and made more numerous and redundant, 

but ships are a different matter. How fast, and whether, China can exploit these trends 

remains unclear. But the trends are real nonetheless. As a recent example, China 

reportedly has tested an antiship cruise missile with a 155mile range—more than twice 

that originally expected by U.S. intelligence. And its space assets are surely growing in 

scope. Even if it does not have an extensive imaging satellite network in a decade or so, it 

may be able to orbit one or two reconnaissance satellites that could occasionally detect 

large ships near Taiwan. That might be good enough. If China could find major U.S. 

naval assets with satellites, it would only need to sneak a single airplane, ship, or 

submarine into the region east of Taiwan to have a good chance of sinking a ship. 
Knowing the U.S. reluctance to risk casualties in combat, China might convince itself 

that its plausible ability to kill many hundreds or even thousands of U.S. military 

personnel in a single attack would deter the United States from entering the war in the 

first place. Such a perception by China might well be wrong (just as Argentina was 

wrong to think in 1982, in a somewhat analogous situation, that it could deter Britain 

from deciding to take back the Falkland Islands); but it could still be quite dangerous, 

given the resulting risks of deterrence failure and war. 

China is certainly taking steps to improve its capabilities in space operations. According 

to a Pentagon assessment, "Exploitation of space and acquisition of related technologies 

remain high priorities in Beijing. China is placing major emphasis on improving spacebased reconnaissance and surveillance. . . . China is cooperating with a number of 

countries, including Russia, Ukraine, Brazil, Great Britain, France, Germany, and Italy, 

in order to advance its objectives in space." China will also surely focus on trying to 

neutralize U.S. space assets in any future such conflict; no prudent military planner could 

do anything else, and the early 2007 ASAT test would seem to confirm this logic. 

According to the Pentagon, in language written before that 2007 test: 

Publicly, China opposes the militarization of space, and seeks to prevent 

or slow the development of anti-satellite (ASAT) systems and space-based 

ballistic missile defenses. Privately, however, China's leaders probably 

view ASATs—and offensive counterspace systems, in general—as well as 

space-based missile defenses as inevitabilities. . . . Given China's current 

level of interest in laser technology, Beijing probably could develop a 

weapon that could destroy satellites in the future.12 

Exactly how many U.S. satellites, and of what type, China might be able to damage or 

destroy is hard to predict. But it seems likely that low-altitude satellites as well as higher 

altitude commercial communications satellites would be vulnerable. Low-altitude 

imaging satellites are vulnerable to direct attack by nuclear-armed missiles, at a 

minimum, by high-energy lasers on the ground, and quite possibly by rapidly orbited or 

predeployed microsatellites as well. They are sufficiently hardened that they would have 

to be attacked one by one to ensure their rapid elimination. And they are sufficiently 

capable of transmitting signals through or around jamming that China probably could not 

stop their effective operation in that way. But they are few enough in number, and 

sufficiently valuable, that China might well find the means to go after each one. 

For higher altitude military satellite constellations, including the global positioning 

system (GPS), military communications, and electronic intelligence systems, China's task 

would be much harder. Such constellations often have greater numbers of satellites than 

do low-altitude imagery systems. They are probably out of range of most plausible laser 

weapons, as well as ballistic missiles carrying nuclear weapons. They might, however, be 

reached by microsatellites deployed as hunter-killer weapons, particularly if those 

microsatellites had been predeployed (a few might be orbited quickly just before a war, 

but launch constraints could limit their number, since microsatellites headed to different 
orbits would probably require different boosters). They might also be reachable by an 

ASAT similar to what China tested in 2007, once placed on a larger rocket.13 

Finally, high-altitude commercial communications satellites are quite likely to be

vulnerable. Their transmissions to Earth might well be interrupted for a critical period of 

hours or days by jamming or a nuclear burst in the atmosphere. For example, disruption 

of ultra-high-frequency radio signals due to a nuclear burst can last for many hours over a 

ground area of hundreds or even thousands of kilometers per dimension. Unhardened 

satellites might be damaged by a large nuclear weapon at distances of 20,000 to 30,000 

kilometers.They might even be vulnerable to laser blinding. 

So it appears that China will remain quite far behind the United States in military 

capability, relatively rudimentary in its space capabilities and lacking in sophisticated 

electronic warfare techniques and similar means of disrupting command and 

communications. But it could hamper some satellite operations, and it could have an 

"asymmetric capability" to find, target, and attack U.S. Navy ships (not to mention 

commercial ships trying to survive the postulated blockade of Taiwan). 

Some might argue that the above analysis overstates the potential role of satellites. For 

example, even if China would have a hard time getting aircraft close enough to track U.S. 

ships, given American air supremacy, it might have other means. For example, it may be 

able to use a sea-based acoustic network. Such a system most likely would be deployed 

on the seabed, as with the U.S. sound surveillance system (SOSUS) array. On that logic, 

China may have so many options and capabilities that it need not depend on any one 

type, such as space assets. 

Or China may not be able to make good use of any improvements it can achieve in its 

satellite capabilities. To use a reconnaissance-strike complex to attack a U.S. carrier, one 

needs not only periodic localization of the carrier, but also real-time tracking and 

dissemination of that information to a missile that is capable of reaching the carrier and 

defeating its defenses. The reconnaissance-strike complex must also be resilient in the 

face of enemy action. The PRC is not close to having such a capability either in its 

constituent parts or as part of an integrated real-time network. 

But the case for concern in general, and for special concern about Chinese satellite 

capabilities in particular, is still rather strong. If China does improve its satellite 

capabilities for imaging and communications, the United States could be quite hardpressed to defeat them without ASAT capabilities. Destroying ground stations could 

require deep inland strikes— and may not work if China builds mobile stations. The 

sheer size of the PRC also makes it difficult to jam downlinks; the United States cannot 

flood all of China continuously with high-energy radio waves. (Although the United 

States may be able to jam links to antiship cruise missiles already in flight, if it can detect 

them, it would be imprudent to count on this defense alone.) Jamming uplinks may be 

difficult as well if China anticipates the possibility and develops good encryption 

technology or a satellite mode of operations in which incoming signals are ignored for 

certain periods of time. Jamming any PRC radar-imaging satellites may work better, 
since such satellites must transmit and receive signals continuously to function. But that 

method would work only if China relied on radar, as opposed to optical, systems. 

In regard to the argument that China could use SOSUS arrays or other such capabilities to 

target U.S. carriers, making satellites superfluous, it should be noted that the United 

States has potential means for countering any such efforts. To deploy a fixed sonar array 

in the vast waters east of Taiwan where U.S. ships would operate in wartime, China 

would need to pre-deploy sensors in a region many hundreds of kilometers on a lateral 

dimension at least. This could be technically quite difficult in such deep waters. Although 

the United States has laid sonar sensors in waters more than 10,000 feet deep, the 

procedure is usually carried out remotely from a ship or by a special submarine, and 

hence becomes more difficult as depth increases. In addition, the United States would 

have a very good chance of recognizing what China was doing. Even though peacetime 

protocols would prohibit preemptive attacks, the United States could be expected to know 

where many of China's underwater assets had been deployed, allowing attacks of one 

kind or another in wartime. The United States is devoting considerable assets to 

intelligence operations in the region already, for example, with its attack submarine force. 

It would similarly have a good chance of detecting and destroying Chinese airborne 

platforms, including even small unmanned aircraft systems, used for reconnaissance 

purposes. 

On balance, growing Chinese satellite capabilities for targeting and communications 

could be an important ingredient in what Beijing might take (or mistake) for a warwinning capability in the future. China would not need to think it had matched the U.S. 

Armed Forces in most military categories, only that it had an asymmetric ability to pose 

greater risks to the United States than Washington might consider acceptable in the event 

of a future Taiwan Strait crisis. 

China might also have the means to attack U.S. space assets, particularly lower-flying 

reconnaissance satellites, by 2010 (if it does not already). It is not entirely out of the 

question that China might use nuclear weapons to do so systematically, knowing that 

such a strike might greatly weaken U.S. military capabilities without killing many, if any, 

Americans. China attaches enough political importance to holding onto Taiwan that it 

might well prove quite willing to run some risk of escalation in order to do so—

especially if its leaders thought they had deduced a clever way to escalate without 

inviting massive retaliation. Whether it could disrupt or destroy most satellites is unclear. 

Whether it could reach large numbers of GPS and communications assets in medium 

Earth orbit and geosynchronous orbit is doubtful. But for these and other reasons, it is 

also doubtful that the United States could operate its space assets with impunity, or count 

on completely dominating military space operations, in such a scenario. 

The United States is not in danger of falling behind China, Iran, or any other country in 

military capability in the coming years and decades, and its own capabilities will 

probably grow, in absolute terms, faster than those of any other country. But its relative 

position could still suffer in a number of military spheres, including space-related 

activities. Its satellites will be less dependable in conflict than they are today or have been 
in recent years. Other countries may also mimic the U.S. ability to use satellites and 

accompanying ground assets for targeting and real-time attack missions. The trends are 

not so unfavorable or so rapid as to require urgent remedial action. Indeed, the United 

States has military and political reasons to show restraint in most areas of space 

weaponry. But passive defensive measures should be expanded and some potential 

offensive capabilities investigated so as to retain the option of weaponizing them in the 

future, if necessary. 

Arms Control and Weaponization Options 

Proposals for space arms control may be grouped into three broad categories. First are 

outright prohibitions of indefinite duration and broad scope. Second are confidencebuilding measures, such as requirements for advance notification of space launches and 

keep-out zones around deployed satellites. Third are informal understandings, worked out 

in talks or more likely established through the unilateral but mutual actions of major 

powers. 

Overall, space arms control should not be a top priority for the United States in the future, 

contrary to what many arms control traditionalists have concluded. Some specific accords 

of limited scope, such as a treaty banning collisions or explosions that would produce 

debris above a certain (low) altitude, and confidence-building measures such as keep-out 

zones near deployed satellites, do make sense. But the inability to verify compliance with 

more sweeping prohibitions, the inherent antisatellite capabilities of many missile 

defense systems, and the military need to counter efforts by other countries to use 

satellites to target American military assets all suggest that comprehensive accords 

banning the weaponization of space are both impractical and undesirable. That said, the 

United States should not want to hasten the weaponization of space and indeed should 

want to avoid such an eventuality. It benefits from its own military uses of space greatly 

and disproportionately at present. It should take unilateral action, such as by declaring 

that it has no dedicated antisatellite weapons programs, to help buttress the status quo as 

much as possible. 

One type of arms control accord on activities in space would be quite comprehensive, 

calling for no testing, production, or deployment of ASATs of any kind, based in space or 

on the ground, at any time; no Earth-attack weapons stationed in space, ever; and formal, 

permanent treaties codifying these prohibitions. These provisions are in line with those in 

proposals made by the Chinese and Russian delegations to the UN Conference on 

Disarmament in Geneva. They also are supported by some traditional arms control 

proponents who argue that space should be a sanctuary from weaponization and that the 

Outer Space Treaty already strongly suggests as much.14 

These provisions suffer from three main flaws. To begin, it is difficult to be sure that 

other countries' satellite payloads are not ASATs. This is especially true in regard to 

microsatellites, which are hard to track. Some have proposed inspections of all payloads 

going into orbit, but this would not prevent a "breakout," in which a country on the verge 

of war would simply refuse to continue to abide by the provisions. Since microsats can be 
tested for maneuverability without making them look like ASATs and are being so tested, 

it will be difficult to preclude this scenario. A similar problem arises with the idea of 

banning specific types of experimentation, such as outdoor experiments or flight testing.15 

A laser can be tested for beam strength and pointing accuracy as a ballistic missile 

defense device without being identified as an ASAT. A microsat can be tested for 

maneuverability as a scientific probe, even if its real purpose is different, since 

maneuvering microsats capable of colliding with other satellites may have no visible 

features clearly revealing their intended purpose. Bans on outdoor testing of declared 

ASAT devices would do little to impede their development. 

Second, more broadly, it is not possible to prevent certain types of weapons designed for 

ballistic missile defense from being used as ASATs. This is in essence a problem of 

verification. However, the issue is less of verification per se than of knowing the intent of 

the country building a given system—and ensuring that its intent never changes. The 

latter goals are unrealistic. Some systems designed for missile defense have inherent 

ASAT capabilities and will retain them, due to the laws of physics, regardless of what 

arms control prohibitions are developed, and countries possessing these systems will 

recognize their latent capabilities.16 For example, the American midcourse missile defense 

system and the airborne laser would both have inherent capabilities against low Earth 

orbit (LEO) satellites, if given good information on a satellite's location—easy to 

obtain—and perhaps some software modifications. The United States could declare for 

the time being that it will not link these missile defense systems to satellite networks or 

give them the necessary communications and software capabilities to accept such data. 

But such restraints, while currently worthwhile as informal, nonbinding measures, are 

difficult to verify and easy to reverse. Thus, no robust, long-term formal treaty regime 

should be based on them. Indeed, the problem goes beyond missile defense systems. 

Even the space shuttle, with its ability to maneuver and approach satellites in low Earth 

orbit, has inherent ASAT potential. So do any country's nuclear weapons deployed atop 

ballistic missiles. Explicit testing in ASAT modes can be prohibited, but any prohibition 

could have limited meaning. 

Third, it is not clear that the United States will benefit militarily from an ASAT ban 

forever. The scenario of a war in the Taiwan Strait is a good example of how, someday, 

the United States could be put at serious risk by another country's satellites.17 That day is 

not near, and there are many other possible ways to deal with the worry in the near term 

besides developing destructive ASATs. But over time, a possible need for such a weapon 

cannot be ruled out. 

There is a stronger argument for banning Earth-attack weapons based in space. Most such 

weapons would probably require considerable testing. That means that testing might well 

be verifiable (especially if testing via ballistic missile were also prohibited). Furthermore, 

prohibitions on such weapons will cost the United States little, since it will retain other 

possible recourses to delivering weapons quickly over long distances (as may other 

countries). So a ban may make sense. The most powerful counterargument to banning 

ground-attack weapons in space is that the long-term need for them cannot be easily 
assessed now. But physical realities do suggest that the United States will be able to make 

do without them or to find alternatives. 

A number of specific prohibitions, fairly narrowly construed, are worth considering as 

well. They could be carefully tailored so as not to preclude development of various 

capabilities in the future, given the realities and security requirements noted. But they 

nevertheless could help to reassure other countries about U.S. intentions at a time of stillunsettled great power relations and help protect space against the creation of excessive 

debris or other hazards to safe use over the longer term. Measures could include the 

following: 

• temporary prohibitions, possibly renewable, on the development, testing, and 

deployment of ASATs, Earth-attack weapons, or both 

• bans on testing or deployment of ASATs above set altitudes in space 

• bans on debris-producing ASATs 

• no first use of ASATs and space weapons. 

Compliance with temporary formal treaty prohibitions would be no more verifiable than 

permanent bans. But they could make sense when future strategic and technological 

circumstances cannot easily be predicted. 

There are downsides to signing accords from which one might very well withdraw, of 

course. If and when the United States could no longer support the prohibitions involved, 

it would likely suffer in the court of international public opinion by its unwillingness to 

extend the accord, even if the accord was specifically designed to be nonpermanent. The 

experience of the United States in withdrawing from the Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty 

suggests that the damage from such decisions can be limited. But that experience also 

suggests that it requires a great deal of effort to lay the diplomatic foundation for 

withdrawal, that bitterness about such a decision can persist thereafter, and that

withdrawal from one treaty regimen— however outdated—might be used as a 

justification by other states to withdraw from more important and less outdated treaties 

that they find undesirable. On balance, accords of indefinite duration should not be 

entered into unless one expects to remain part of them indefinitely, so I tend to oppose 

most such accords. 

Bans on testing or employing ASATs that produce debris make sense and could well be 

codified by binding international treaty. Destructive testing of weapons such as the 

Clinton administration's midcourse missile defense system or other hit-to-kill or 

explosive devices against objects in satellite orbital zones would not only increase the 

risks of an ASAT competition, it would also create debris in LEO regions that would 

remain in orbit indefinitely (that is, unless the testing occurred in what are effectively the 

higher parts of the Earth's atmosphere, where air resistance would ultimately bring down 

debris and where few if any satellites fly in any case). The U.S. military worries about 

this debris-producing effect of testing. To date, tests of the midcourse system have 

occurred at roughly 140 miles altitude, producing debris that deorbits within roughly 20 
minutes, but future tests will be higher. A ceiling of 300 to 500 miles might be placed on 

such tests and a ban placed on using targets that are in orbit. 

Another category of arms accords includes those that do not limit the weapons 

capabilities of states but instead seek to establish rules or guidelines for how states use 

their military assets. The goals would be to reduce tension, improve communications, and 

build safety mechanisms into how countries make military use of outer space. This arms 

control concept would build on some of the agreements that the nuclear superpowers 

signed to reduce the potential for unintentional nuclear confrontation during the Cold 

War, including the 1972 Incidents at Sea Agreement and agreements to set up 

communications hotlines.18 Here the stakes might not be so great, but they could still be 

great enough to justify some straightforward measures and rules of the road—as long as 

no great effort has to be expended to work out some commonly accepted practices. 

One such idea is that of establishing keep-out zones around deployed satellites. There is 

no reason for a satellite to approach within a few tens of kilometers—or, in some orbits, 

within even hundreds of kilometers—of another satellite. Any close approach can thus be 

assumed to be hostile and ruled out as an acceptable action. States might consider 

formalizing this understanding of keep-out zones. The idea makes particularly good sense 

if there is a way to monitor compliance. Future American satellites are expected to have 

more sensors capable of surveying the environment around them, so this approach may 

work.19 

What real strategic purpose would be served by such zones? Unless satellites were 

themselves given self-defense capabilities—making them difficult to distinguish from 

offensive ASATs—the zones could not be enforced. And any country wishing to develop 

a close-approach capability for the purpose of ultimately launching a large-scale ASAT 

surprise attack could develop that capability despite the existence of keep-out zones, by 

testing against its own space assets or even against empty points in space. 

That said, the idea may still make sense, even though keep-out zones would not 

substantially limit military capabilities. First, creating such zones would add another step 

that any state planning an attack would have to address. ASATs could not easily be 

predeployed near other satellites without arousing suspicion (especially if the United 

States and other countries deployed satellites with sensors capable of monitoring their 

neighborhoods). Second, any state violating the keep-out zones would tend to tip off the 

targeted country about its likely intentions; conversely, respecting the zones would 

constitute a form of restraint that could calm nerves to some modest but perhaps 

worthwhile degree. And the United States has no need to place satellites near other 

countries' space assets in any case, so it would not be giving up anything to endorse such 

a rule of the road. On balance, this idea is a worthy one for a treaty regime, though not 

worth a great deal of top-level time to negotiate. 

What of advance notice of space launches? Again, this type of accord, such as that 

reached between the United States and Russia during the Clinton administration, would 

not prevent a country from breaking out suddenly, nor would it place a meaningful 
constraint on capabilities. But as long as it was observed, countries would have additional 

reassurance that others were playing by the rules. They would also have time to prepare 

to observe the deployment of satellites from any launch, allowing slightly greater 

confidence that ASATs were not being deployed. As a peacetime rule of the road at least, 

it makes sense. Some have also suggested allowing international monitoring of space 

payloads prior to their launch.20 This seems questionable, though, since satellites could be 

effective ASATs without carrying payloads that made that obvious. 

On balance, several of these confidence-building measures are marginally useful. They 

will not prevent the United States from retaining its hedges against a future need for 

ASATs, whether in the form of dual-purpose ballistic missile defense programs or even 

dedicated antisatellite systems. They will not prevent China or another country from 

quietly building inherent ASAT capability either. But they will add an extra step or two 

that other countries choosing to weaponize space would need to deal with before

threatening American interests. 

A final category of measures would not involve arms control at all— in the formal sense 

of signed treaties and binding commitments—but rather unofficial and unilateral 

restraints. Such restraints would not force the United States to tie one hand behind its 

back and leave other countries free to develop space weapons; rather, by adopting the 

restraints and thereby setting a precedent and a tone, the United States would aim to 

encourage other countries to reciprocate. To the extent others did not show restraint, the 

policy could be reconsidered. This approach has several precedents in international 

affairs. For example, during the first Bush administration, the United States reduced the 

alert levels of some nuclear forces and took tactical nuclear weapons off naval vessels in 

part to encourage similar Soviet actions, which followed.21 This approach can work more 

quickly than formal arms control; it can also preserve flexibility should circumstances 

change. It is perhaps most useful when it is not absolutely critical that all countries 

immediately comply with a given set of rules or restraints. In other words, if the United 

States would have ample time to change its policy in the event that other countries failed 

to cooperate, without doing harm to its security interests in the interim, there is much to 

be said for this approach. 

Since the United States is not presently building or deploying space weapons, informal 

restraint would presumably apply to research and development and testing activities. As 

one example, if a treaty to accomplish this goal could not be quickly negotiated, the 

United States could make a unilateral pledge not to create space debris through testing of 

any ASAT.22 The flexibility associated with such a pledge might permit it to go further 

and also pledge not to produce any ASAT that would ever create debris, given that even 

if the United States needs a future ASAT, it would have alternative technological options. 

The United States might also consider making a clear statement that it has no dedicated 

ASAT programs and no intention of initiating development or deployment of any, if that 

is true. It could also declare that it will not test any systems, including high-powered 

lasers, microsatellites, and ballistic missile defenses, in an ASAT mode. The latter 
approach would have the greatest chance of eliciting verifiable reciprocation by other 

countries. 

The downsides to such statements are that if and when U.S. policy requirements changed, 

the statements would have to be repudiated, raising alarms abroad and risking a greater 

diplomatic problem than would occur if the United States had never held itself to 

informal restraints. The advantages are that they might buy the United States some time, 

allowing it to play its part in stigmatizing space weapons it has no strategic interest in 

developing or seeing developed any time soon. 

Conclusion 

While I have spent considerable time on arms control options, it is worth concluding with 

an observation on which military measures do make some sense now (even as options are 

preserved for considering others in the future). First, improved American space 

surveillance is needed, largely to know what other countries are doing with their 

microsatellites. Second, individual American satellites would also benefit from local 

situational awareness so that Department of Defense officials will know if satellites are 

approached closely. Third, and most of all, the vulnerability of key U.S. satellites to a 

Rumsfeldian Space Pearl Harbor—admittedly a melodramatic and exaggerated image, 

but still a useful caution and reminder—should be mitigated. This requires hardening 

against electromagnetic pulse and shielding optical components against blinding lasers. 

Someday, it could require creating mechanisms to deal with excess heat from lasers with 

prolonged dwell times. It also argues strongly in favor of redundancy. That need not 

mean rapid-launch satellite replenishment capability. But it does argue for a portfolio of 

reconnaissance capabilities, including airbreathing capabilities. 

Military space policy is and will remain complex, with judgments constantly required 

about which programs make strategic sense and serve American national security 

objectives. To be sure, that argument is frustrating for those who would prefer the 

analytical and rhetorical simplicity of the argument that space must remain man's last 

unmilitarized frontier or that space, like all other frontiers, will eventually be militarized, 

so we may as well get on with it first. But a balanced approach reflects reality and the 

complex web of interests that the United States needs to advance in the years ahead.

Notes

1. This section draws heavily on Michael E. O'Hanlon, Neither Star Wars nor Sanctuary: 

Constraining the Military Use of Space (Washington, DC: Brookings Institution, 2004). 

2. See, for example, Theresa Hitchens, "Monsters and Shadows: Left Unchecked, American Fears 

Regarding Threats to Space Assets Will Drive Weaponization," Disarmament Forum 1 (2003), 24. 

3. See transcript of the panel discussion held in the United Nations on October 19, 2000, by the NGO 

Committee on Disarmament, available at <www.igc.org/disarm/T191000outerspace.htm>; and 

statement by Hu Xiaodi, ambassador for disarmament affairs of China, at the Plenary of the 

Conference on Disarmament,June 7, 2001, available at 
<www3.itu.int/missions/China/disarmament/2001files/disarmdoc010607.htm>; and "China, 

Russia Want Space Weapons Banned," Philadelphia Inquirer, August 23, 2002. 

4. See Canadian Working Paper Concerning Conference on Disarmament Action on Outer Space, 

January 21, 1998, available at <www.fas.org/nuke/control/paros/docs/1487.htm>; James Clay 

Moltz, "Breaking the Deadlock on Space Arms Control," Arms Control Today (April 2002), 

available at <www.armscontrol.org/act/2002_04/moltzapril02.asp?print>. 

5. Peter L. Hays, United States Military Space: Into the Twenty-first Century (Montgomery, AL: Air 

University Press, 2002), 11–13; Alvin and Heidi Toffler, War and Anti-War: Survival at the Dawn 

of the 21st Century (Boston: Little, Brown, 1993); Stuart E. Johnson and Martin C. Libicki, eds., 

Dominant Battlespace Knowledge (Washington, DC: National Defense University Press, 1996); 

Thomas A. Keaney and Eliot A. Cohen, Gulf War Air Power Survey Summary Report 

(Washington, DC: U.S. Government Printing Office, 1993); William Owens, Lifting the Fog of 

War (New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2000); Daniel Goure and Christopher M. Szara, eds., 

Air and Space Power in the New Millennium (Washington, DC: Center for Strategic and 

International Studies, 1997); Defense Science Board 1996 Summer Study Task Force, Tactics and 

Technology for 21st Century Military Superiority (Washington, DC: Department of Defense, 

1996); James P. Wade and Harlan K. Ullman, Shock and Awe: Achieving Rapid Dominance 

(Washington, DC: National Defense University Press, 1996); George and Meredith Friedman, The 

Future of War: Power, Technology, and American World Dominance in the 21st Century (New 

York: Crown Publishers, 1996); John Arquilla and David Ronfeldt, eds., In Athena's Camp: 

Preparing for Conflict in the Information Age (Santa Monica, CA: RAND Corporation, 1997); 

National Defense Panel, Transforming Defense: National Security in the 21st Century (Arlington, 

VA: The Pentagon, December 1997); and Joint Chiefs of Staff, Joint Vision 2010 (Washington, 

DC: Department of Defense, 1996) and Joint Vision 2020 (Washington, DC: Department of 

Defense, 2000). 

6. Barry D. Watts, The Military Use of Space: A Diagnostic Assessment (Washington, DC: Center 

for Strategic and Budgetary Assessments, 2001), 29–30. 

7. Bates Gill and Martin Kleiber, "China's Space Odyssey," Foreign Affairs 86, no. 3 (May– June 

2007), 2–6. 

8. Paul B. Stares, Space and National Security (Washington, DC: Brookings Institution, 1987), 147. 

9. Peter L. Hays, "Military Space Cooperation: Opportunities and Challenges," in Future Security in 

Space: Commercial, Military, and Arms Control Trade-Offs, ed. James Clay Moltz, Occasional 

Paper No. 10 (Monterey, CA: Monterey Institute of International Studies, 2002), 37. 

10. This view is hardly confined to conservatives; see, for example, Ashton Carter, "Satellites and 

Anti-Satellites: The Limits of the Possible," International Security 10, no. 4 (Spring 1986), 47. 

11. Jonathan Dean, "Defenses in Space: Treaty Issues," in Moltz, 4. 

12. Department of Defense, Annual Report to Congress: The Military Power of the People's Republic 

of China, July 28, 2003, 36, available at <www.defenselink.mil/pubs/2003chinaex.pdf>. 

13. Geoffrey Forden, "After China's Test: Time for a Limited Ban on Anti-Satellite Weapons," Arms 

Control Today 37, no. 3 (April 2007), 19–23. 

14. See Rebecca Johnson, Missile Defence and the Weaponisation of Space, International Security 

Information Service Policy Paper on Ballistic Missile Defense No. 11 (London: International 

Security Information Service, January 2003), available at <www.isisuk.demon.co.uk>; Jonathan 

Dean, "Defenses in Space: Treaty Issues," in Moltz, 4; George Bunn and John B. Rhinelander, 

"Outer Space Treaty May Ban Strike Weapons," Arms Control Today 32, no. 5 (June 2002), 24; 

and Bruce M. Deblois, "Space Sanctuary: A Viable National Strategy," Aerospace Power Journal 

(Winter 1998), 41. 

15. For a proposal along these lines, see Michael Krepon with Christopher Clary, "Space Assurance or 

Space Dominance? The Case against Weaponizing Space," Henry L. Stimson Center, 2003, 109–

110. 

16. For an earlier, highly sophisticated argument along these lines, see John Tirman, ed., The Fallacy 

of Star Wars (New York: Vintage Books, 1984). 

17. See O'Hanlon. 

18. For a good discussion, see Krepon and Clary, 114–124. 
19. For an example of a specific proposal along these lines, see Michael Krepon, "Model Code of 

Conduct for the Prevention of Incidents and Dangerous Military Practices in Outer Space," Henry 

L. Stimson Center, 2004, available at <www.stimson.org/wos/pdf/codeofconduct.pdf>. 

20. Krepon and Clary, 93. 

21. For a summary, see David Mosher and Michael O'Hanlon, The START Treaty and Beyond 

(Washington, DC: Congressional Budget Office, October 1991), 34–35; Ivo H. Daalder, 

Cooperative Arms Control: A New Agenda for the Post–Cold War Era, CISSM Papers No. 1, 

University of Maryland at College Park (October 1992), 23–27. 

22. Hays, "Military Space Cooperation: Opportunities and Challenges," in Moltz, 42. 
Chapter 22:

International Perspectives: Russia

James E. Oberg

Russia spent the year 2007 commemorating its half-century of activity in space and the 

men who helped make it happen. Events celebrated included the 150th anniversary of 

Konstantin Tsiolkovsky's birth, the birth centenary of Sergei Korolev, and the 50-year 

anniversary of the launch of the world's first artificial satellite in the Soviet Union. But 

with good reason, Russia was also celebrating the improving prospects for its space 

future. Lamentable hangovers from its more recent "space slump" have been fading 

away, although not entirely. 

Not far from the main launch pad at the Baykonur cosmodrome—a pad that hosted the 

Sputnik blastoff on October 4, 1957, and the Yuri Gagarin blastoff on April 12, 1961, and 

that still hosts Soyuz booster launches—stands a simple obelisk. It is surmounted by a 

full-size metal sculpture of Sputnik and supports a small plaque that reads, "Here through 

the genius of Soviet man began the relentless assault on space." But the succeeding 50 

years saw a mixture of relentless assault and single-minded perseverance with wasteful 

detours, dead-ended spectacles, desperate gambles, and shriveling budgets. Interplanetary 

probes pioneered the routes to nearby planets but could reach no farther. Operating 

lifetimes of affordable satellites were so short that mass quantities had to be successively 

launched into orbit—with the unintended benefit of providing a major surge (or casualty 

replacement) capability for military systems. Endurance marathons on manned space 

stations and resolute repair missions in the face of daunting breakdowns demonstrated the 

resilience of manned spaceflight—and the inability of the Soviet economy to industrially 

exploit the opportunities of the space frontier. 

Many space strategies have evolved to keep pace with these changing circumstances. 

Where once the Soviet Union saw itself as a lone pioneer leading humanity into space, 

Russia now portrays itself as an essential partner of other spacefaring nations. Where 

once Soviet scientists foresaw national wealth from exploiting space conditions and

space-based vantage points, Russian government planners now see their main spacerelated cash flow in sales of know-how, goods, and services to other spacefaring powers. 

Where once fleets of military space systems were seen as force multipliers for the Soviet 

armed forces on expansive missions, a much more constrained Russian military 

establishment now struggles not to be left hopelessly behind by U.S. and other national 

military space infrastructures, even as its fear of military confrontation ebbs. 

Fifty years on, top Russian leaders have paid homage to the value of the country's space 

activities. "The industry is an integral part of the national defense industry and one of the 

flagship national industrial branches," Russian deputy prime minister and defense 

minister Sergei Ivanov said recently while addressing Russia's Defense Industry 
Commission in Moscow.1 "Thus, space industry development is a must for ensuring 

Russia's independent space exploration." At another event, Ivanov stressed the role of a 

nation's military-industrial complex as "a locomotive of high technology, economy and 

knowledge practically in all countries of the world," 2 and added, "We are not an 

exception from this rule, because over half of the country's total scientific potential is still 

concentrated in the defense and industrial complex sphere." 

Russian President Vladimir Putin directed the head of the Federal Space Agency, Anatoli 

Perminov, to work out a 30-year strategy extending to about 2040. "He wants the 

guidelines of the development of space exploration in the country determined," Perminov 

explained. "That includes above all the development of existing launching sites, the 

group of space assets in orbit in different departments—communications, remote sensing, 

weather watch and so on. Naturally, some work is to be done for defense that includes 

new carrier rockets and the ground infrastructure and control of space systems in orbit." 

To examine the route from where Russia is in space to where it wants to be, it is useful to 

survey the human, financial, administrative, and technical resources at its disposal, and 

then extrapolate from there. 

The Human Factor 

The fundamental basis for any activity is the team of people who are to carry it out. Here, 

Russia is still struggling with personnel management issues that stretch back to the very 

beginning of the space era. A successful resolution of these issues—still in doubt—is 

fundamental to any hope of success in the coming decades. 

To a far greater extent than in the United States, Russia created and then depended on a 

large cadre of specialists hired as young people in the Sputnik era. They worked together 

for decades and knew each others' specialties. Along the way, they brought in a few 

apprentices, but as a rule they relied on their own experience, memories, intuition, and 

expertise, which were rarely documented in a form accessible to others. 

As a result, the average age of space workers in many key facilities in the 1990s was only 

a few years less than the average male life expectancy of 59. If 20-year-old military 

draftees in the Russian Space Forces are counted, a lower value can be obtained (47 is the 

current official average age), but unquestionably this remains a critical challenge for the 

coming decade when half a century of expertise must be transferred or lost (and then 

slowly and painfully reacquired). 

"Staffing is a painful problem for us," Perminov said at a news conference in 2006. "It 

has always been a big problem and it is particularly an acute problem now."3 "If there is 

no inflow of young specialists," Russian prime minister Mikhail Fradkov had told 

reporters in July 2005, "everything could be lost, regardless of the money invested." 4

Sergei Ivanov had told newsmen much the same thing in late 2006. The chiefs of defense 

enterprises, he said, are concerned "not so much about financing as about who will work, 
where to get qualified personnel." One press report attributed to Ivanov the idea that "a 

shortfall of such cadre is increasingly apparent."5 Ivanov concluded, "The shortage of 

personnel is the main problem facing the rocket and space industry."6

Perminov has directly addressed his strategy for finding such employees. They come 

from institutes such as Bauman University and the Moscow Aviation Institute, as well as 

from the military. "They mostly work at space launch sites, in particular, Baykonur," 

Perminov noted. 7 But new employees in their late 40s will not help drive down the 

average age of the team. 

Recruitment remains hit-or-miss, with some organizations showing large influxes of 

young people, as long as the cash flow remains healthy. But to a large extent, every new 

employee is a potential ex-employee to a degree rarely seen in the previous generation. In 

those days, there were few other jobs with as much prestige, intellectual stimulation, or 

access to exclusive privileges, but today that has all changed, and young people know it. 

There are enthusiasts and loyalists—often the children of current or past workers—but 

there just are not enough of them to even replace the bodies, much less the experienced 

minds, now hemorrhaging irretrievably from the industry. 

The way in which Russian space workers are organized into teams has also evolved. 

Under the Soviet regime, federal agencies and industrial enterprises were often arbitrarily 

yoked together on projects that operated by fiat, not by budget (there was no quantitative 

"cash flow" to gauge levels of effort). Conflicts and alliances developed in an almost 

byzantine style (some mergers were actually sealed by marriages, or even what looked 

like exchanges of hostages). Operating as quasi-autonomous satrapies, space and rocket 

firms were vertically integrated, often possessing their own support industries, hospitals, 

and even their own food supplies. 

Major Players 

Only in 1993, in response to negotiations with the United States, did Moscow convert an 

administrative ministry into an executive agency with its own budget—the "Russian 

Space Agency," or Roskosmos (the name has evolved over the years). A parallel military 

command, usually called some variation of "Russian military space forces" and 

transferred among major branches of the armed forces every few years, handled 

infrastructure operations and military-related space vehicles. Both agencies dealt with a 

crazy-quilt array of academic and industrial entities. 

The most important firms are: 

• Energiya Rocket and Space Corporation, Moscow: human spacecraft, Progress 

freighters, Block-D upper stages, and communications satellites, and operates 

Mission Control Center. Management was replaced recently in a "hostile 

takeover" by the Russian Space Agency. 

• Khrunichev State Research and Production Space Center, Moscow: Proton 

rockets, space station large modules, Rokot intercontinental ballistic missile 
(ICBM)–derived small launchers, and small satellites. This firm is the developer 

of the Angara booster family. Its finances are shaky. 

• Progress State Research and Production Rocket Space Center, Samara: Soyuz 

booster fabrication and reconnaissance satellites 

• Applied Mechanics Scientific and Production Organization, Krasnoyarsk: 

communications and navigation satellites 

• Lavochkin Design Bureau, Moscow-Khimki: lunar and planetary probes, military 

reconnaissance satellites, and other small satellites 

• Moscow Institute of Thermal Technologies: sole remaining active 

ICBM/submarine-launched ballistic missile (SLBM) manufacturer (Topol, Bulava 

missiles, START–1 small satellite launcher) 

• Production Association Polyot, Omsk: Kosmos satellite launcher, global 

navigation satellite system (GLONASS) navigation satellites, Angara booster 

elements 

• Gagarin Cosmonaut Training Center, Zvyozdny: cosmonaut training. Currently 

undergoing a tumultuous transfer from military to civilian management. 

• Krasnoznamensk (Golytsino-2), near Moscow: central space communications and 

control hub, operated by military space forces. 

Other smaller entities build weather and Earth resources satellites, perform basic 

research, and provide support services. 

A major challenge today is the consolidation of hundreds of these groups, large and 

small, that make up the Russian space industrial base. Perminov recently put the total at 

"about 112 spearhead enterprises," and his job is to reduce this number to a dozen. 

Specific skills are to be retained, while duplication in support technologies is to be 

eliminated. 

Andrei Kislyakov, a retired space official who now writes for the Novosti news agency, 

has described the lack of progress toward this goal over the past several years: "On 

October 11, 2001, the Russian government approved the federal target program 

'Overhauling and Expanding the Defense Industry in 2002–2006.' A conference on July 6 

[2006] that discussed the same issue indicated there had been no achievements in this 

sphere. . . . Anatoly Perminov said Russia's 100-plus space-rocket companies will be 

merged into 10 integrated companies, and the entire industry will have just 3 or 4 

corporations by 2015. It is a tried and tested way. Unfortunately, they are only now 

starting to implement this plan, rather than in 2001." 8

Budgetary Concerns 

These enterprises and their overseeing bureaucracies had been operating on dwindling 

funds since the late 1980s—an impoverishment that grew even worse with the collapse of 

the Soviet Union and the loss of many industrial elements to newly independent nations. 

But the 20-year-long specter of poverty has faded. According to Perminov, "This year 

[2006] for the first time the entire sum allocated for the federal space program, as far as 

the Federal Space Agency is concerned, has been disbursed."9
This financial well-being is largely based on reliance on what is euphemistically called 

"extra-budget sources" (in reality, sales to Western customers). "This year [2006] 23 

billion rubles has been provided for the federal space program," Perminov explained. 

"Next year it will be 24.4 billion rubles, with no account of extra revenues. Combined 

with other programs, this makes a total of 35 billion to 36 billion rubles." 10 That means 

that about 12 billion rubles, or a third of the total space budget, has to be raised 

commercially. 

This fraction has remained fairly constant in recent years. In 2006, for the period 2006 to 

2015, 305 billion rubles (about $10 billion) had been allocated, with the expectation that 

an additional 130 billion rubles will come from "off-budget sources." That equals about 

$400 million per year of foreign funding, or about 30 percent of the operating funds (by 

comparison, from 1996 to 2000, 60 percent of the space budget was foreign funding, and 

in the first half of this decade, the figure has been about 30 percent). 11

At least the space industry can again pay its workers. "As for salaries, we have done 

away with this problem," Perminov declared. "This year [2006] there are no enterprises 

with arrears of wages." Salaries range from 11,000 rubles to 20,000 rubles, not generous 

in Russian terms by any means—but a living wage, especially in two-income families.12

Launch Sites 

Baykonur

The primary Russian space launch facility at Baykonur is undergoing profound transition 

as operating elements of the Russian Military Space Forces hand over facilities to the 

civilian Federal Space Agency. Progressive infrastructure collapse has been locally 

reversed through investments by commercial satellite launch groups. Political 

arrangements with the government of Kazakhstan have stabilized, although both Russian 

and Kazakh officials have begun expressing anxiety about signs of Islamic extremist 

activities among the local population. 

"A lot of work has been done to transfer Baykonur facilities from the Defense Ministry to 

Roskosmos," Perminov noted in December 2006. "A total of 62 facilities were handed 

over this year and the remaining ones will be handed over by the end of 2007. All the 

facilities have been accepted, and operational units have been appointed."13

Management and maintenance of decaying structures have been a challenge. When the 

massive Building 254, built in the late 1970s to house the Buran shuttle, was converted to 

processing modules and spacecraft for the International Space Station, the Buran orbiter 

that had made the program's single orbital flight in late 1988 was moved to Building 112 

next door (it was built in the mid-1960s for the abortive Soviet man-to-the-Moon 

program). A low bay of that building had already been converted to house payload 

processing for the commercial Soyuz launch company Starsem, and an adjoining medium 

bay was modified to process Soyuz booster processing after the condition of the original 

assembly hall (built in 1956) deteriorated dangerously. But the high bay area housing the 
Buran collapsed in 2001, killing six workers and destroying the flown shuttle. Yet the 

pressing need for booster processing facilities—and the availability of investment 

funds—led to the decision to repair and reopen one of the two collapsed high bays. 

Plesetsk 

The mainly military space and missile launch facility north of Moscow has also been 

undergoing significant infrastructure enhancement, both in space operations and in 

worker living conditions. In particular, launch pads for Russia's first new booster in more 

than 20 years, the Angara family, are nearing completion. 

Sergey Ivanov has described the Angara launch site as a "task of state importance" and 

asserted that the new pads will give Russia "a guaranteed, and independent from any 

political or economic circumstances, access to outer space." Once operational, the pads 

will allow the transfer of military and dual-purpose spacecraft launches from Baykonur to 

Plesetsk.14 This will involve launchings into all operational orbits including 

geosynchronous (24-hour equatorial), either through use of a larger plane change during 

direct ascent or via fuel-efficient but operationally complex orbital plane change 

maneuvers utilizing lunar fly-by (currently, such orbits can only be reached from 

Baykonur). 

Kapustin Yar 

Russia's original missile launch facility on the lower Volga River continues in operation 

for military missile (including antiaircraft) testing, and spartan living conditions have 

slightly improved according to press reports in 2006. It retains the capability for small 

satellite launchings. 

Svobodny 

The Far East launch site for small commercial satellites, once touted as a replacement for 

major Baykonur operations but threatened with closure, faced an uncertain future. 

Regional governor Leonid Korotkov told reporters in December 2006 that he had 

attended a meeting of the Russia Security Council in Moscow where it was decided not to 

"liquidate" the center. One of its decisions was to propose to the government and the 

Defense Ministry "to find forms of the rational use of the cosmodrome in the interests of 

defense, security and the economy of the country," Korotkov said. "This decision gives 

certain hopes for the preservation of the cosmodrome's infrastructure." 15START–1 

satellite launchers (converted ICBMs) operate from the site's Pad 5. In 2009, the Kremlin 

blessed the creation of a new major launch site near the site, to be called Vostochny and 

to be capable of human space launches. 

Kourou 

Development of a Soyuz launch vehicle capability at the French launch site in French 

Guiana is proceeding. In a formal ceremony in February 2007, Russian officials laid a 
stone from the Sputnik pad in Baykonur at the Kourou space launch site. 16 The Russian 

side is investing 121 million euros of its own money build the Kourou facility. The total 

cost, shared with the European Space Agency, is more than 300 million euros, with a first 

launch expected in late 2009 and more than five launches per year (including potentially 

manned launchings) subsequently. 17

Dombarovsky 

A new satellite launch site was introduced in mid-2006 with the orbiting of a commercial 

payload (Bigelow Aerospace's Genesis-1 inflatable habitat prototype) aboard a modified 

Satan SS–18 ICBM (called Dnepr with the addition of a third stage) from the missile 

field in southwest Siberia. A special hotel and payload processing hangar has been built 

in the support town of Yasny for foreign customers, and more launchings are planned. 

Use of the military base simplifies launch preparations and eliminates issues of 

environmental concerns by the Kazakh government, especially useful in light of the mid2006 launch failure of the same category of booster from Baykonur that resulted in 

significant contamination issues in a sparsely populated region south of Baykonur. 

Sea Launch 

The international consortium that launches Ukrainian-built Zenit rockets from a floating 

platform based in California continues in operation despite a lift-off booster explosion in 

early 2007 that damaged the platform. The project had already been facing major cash 

flow problems due to the inability to perform a critical originally intended mission 

function—to reload the launch platform with a second launch vehicle and payload while 

at sea. With launches limited to a single shot per time-consuming cruise, earnings are 

severely constrained. 

Russia's interest is with the use of a Russian-built upper stage, the D block, a booster that 

has been phased out of most other Russian launches (on Proton it has mostly been 

replaced with a competing vendor's upper stage, called Briz), resulting in significant 

income loss to its manufacturer, the Energiya Rocket and Space Corporation. 

Rumors persist that Ukraine, eager to establish a Zenit launch capability at the Brazilian 

Alcantara launch site, is considering moving Sea Launch operations permanently to 

Brazil, where the existing floating launch platform could be anchored just offshore of 

Alcantara and could be rapidly reloaded after each commercial launch. In late 2006, 

Ukraine completed fabrication of a launch platform for the smaller Tsyklon-4 booster, 

intended for installation at Alcantara to allow commercial launchings on behalf of the 

two-nation Alcantara-Tsyklon-Space corporation. 18

Submarine-launched Boosters 

A converted SLBM booster, renamed Shtil, carried a small German science satellite into 

orbit most recently on May 26, 2006, launched from the submarine Ekaterinberg in the 

Barents Sea. But launch failures have bedeviled this attempted conversion of rockets 
from the Makeyev Bureau. The old rocket factory had been the manufacturer of all but 

the most recent submarine missiles but is now facing bankruptcy after transfer of all 

future military missile contracts to another vendor. Operational advantages of this 

submarine option appear dubious, and cost advantages are far outweighed by the 

daunting failure rate, arguably a consequence of the financial collapse of the missile firm 

that is desperately seeking to avoid dissolution. 

Launch Vehicles 

Russia's family of satellite launch vehicles has been undergoing significant upgrading, 

but plans to shift to a new generation of launchers—the Angara series—continue to 

recede into the indefinite future. 

Soyuz-2 

This is the biggest recent success story for Russian space rocketry. Three successful 

missions with this upgraded booster occurred in 2006, and more are planned (including 

from Kourou). The upgrades include a digital control system that flies a more efficient 

ascent profile and allows a reduction in unburned propellant, a new telemetry system, 

addition of wider and longer payload farings, replacement of non-Russian vendors, more 

efficient main stage engines, and an entirely new third-stage rocket engine. Combined, 

these improvements increase the payload of the vehicle by 1,200 kilograms (almost 20 

percent). The booster is designed for human launches as well. 

This upgrade will allow years of future use for a booster that has, in its basic form, been 

launched almost 1,800 times in the past 50 years. One of its anticipated future missions, 

using a Fregat fourth stage, will be to carry a pair of replacements of improved 

GLONASS-K navigation satellites in 2010, a significant cost reduction of the three-perlaunch Proton missions now needed. 19

Proton 

Russia's most powerful launch vehicle (approximately 20 tons in low Earth orbit) 

continues in use, in recent years exclusively for geosynchronous-bound missions. The 

Proton-M upgrade is now entering service and, as with the Soyuz-2, uses a digital flight 

control system and upgraded first-stage engines, resulting in a 6 percent payload 

performance improvement. The next major upgrade in development will be a cryogenic 

upper stage.20Once operational, it will make the Proton competitive with Ariane-V for 

geosynchronous orbit missions. 

Angara 

The long-anticipated "ecologically friendly" booster family called Angara had been held 

up for years as Russia sought Western funding. "This system has been in development for 

more than a decade," Russian Space Forces commander Colonel General Vladimir 
Popovkin told reporters. "Eventually, an understanding has been reached on how it 

should be funded and when it should be created." 21

Russia spent 1.8 billion rubles ($75 million) on space center development in 2007, most 

of it at Plesetsk, and most of that for the Angara launch support complex. This money 

came from the Defense Ministry budget, not the Russian Space Agency. 22

Angara is being built by the Khrunichev State Research and Production Space Center, the 

builders of the Proton system. But unlike the military-derived missiles that use highly 

toxic hypergolic propellants, Angara is to use more benign kerosene and liquid oxygen. 

Depending on the number of engines and strap-on stages, the system will offer small, 

medium, and large (Angara-5) versions 23 and will replace the Proton rocket (and Soyuz 

as well, perhaps) about 10 years from now. A special Angara-5 version called Baiterek 

will operate under Kazakh auspices from Baykonur, and one Proton launch pad is already 

undergoing modifications. 

These delays are more than merely inconvenient—they threaten the very financial 

rationale for the project. Roskosmos official Aleksandr Chulkov had told Izvestia in 

August 2005 that funding problems continued to delay the new launch vehicle family. 

"The Angara rocket, however promising it may be, will not be ready in the next three 

years," he admitted. By then, he warned, competition from comparable boosters in China, 

India, and Ukraine may have locked up the international market: "Ukrainian rockets are 

serious competitors for Russian cosmonautics, and it will be very difficult to take away 

the leading position which we ensured for them." As a result of the delays, paying 

customers such as Panamsat have cancelled launch contracts worth in aggregate up to 

$700 million in the past 2 years. They have switched to other rockets and may never 

come back to Angara. 

URAL 

A joint Russo-French project called URAL aims at a fully reusable advanced launch 

vehicle burning liquid hydrogen and methane. Whether it is an actual hardware 

development project or a foreign-subsidized hobby shop for underemployed Russian 

space engineers is impossible to tell. 

Air Launch

A project involving an Antonov-124 aircraft and a two-stage satellite launcher called 

Polyot has been in the works for a number of years but moved closer to reality in 2006 

with the beginning of construction of ground facilities on Biak Island in Indonesia. Flight 

tests are promised for 2009 with an operational launch the following year. 

Satellite Deployments 

Russia's collection of about 100 operational satellites displays some striking features that 

are consequences of the severe budget constraints of the past 20 years. The number of 
science satellites, or the number of specific applications satellites, is seriously deficient. 

Networks of military satellites—such as early warning and navigation systems—have 

also been severely degraded. 

In the late 1990s, as orbiting payloads broke down or exhausted their control propellants, 

gaps appeared in the applications networks ( constellations in U.S. terminology, 

groupings in Russian). Despite new launches after 2000, failure rates exceeded 

replacement rates. "Two years ago, it was our understanding that it was simply going to 

collapse," Perminov said in November 2006. "Now that failure has been stalled." 24In 

December 2006, Perminov claimed that the situation had stopped deteriorating and was 

turning around: "Regarding the composition of space assets in orbit—the composition has 

improved, but mainly in terms of quality. As of today, 53 percent of space vehicles are 

operating within their design life spans. Last year that parameter was not so good." 25

Figures released by Perminov indicate that the existing Russian deployment of satellite 

constellations (involving 96 spacecraft, a quarter the size of the U.S. contingent) meets 

only 26 percent of the defined needs of Russia. Funding of future replacement vehicles is 

supposed to raise that level to 51 percent by 2010 and to 90 percent by 2015. Another 

Russian space official said that only 39 of 99 existing spacecraft were "fully operational," 

while the rest were operating in degraded mode well beyond their design lifetimes. 

It is astonishing to note that Russia does not have a single functioning weather satellite in 

orbit. Russian meteorologists have had to purchase their images from foreign satellites. A 

new-model Meteor payload was to be launched in 2007, but the launch slipped into 2009. 

Ultimately, three will be placed in polar orbit and two in geosynchronous orbit.26

In terms of civilian remote sensing satellites, the dearth of payloads is finally being 

remedied. Perminov boasted of a remote Earth sensing Resurs-DK with a resolution of 1 

meter, launched in 2006. "We faced a systemic crisis last year [2005]," he admitted. "At 

the start of last year we didn't have a single remote Earth sensing probe. And the 

launching of that probe—and it is now in operation and bringing good results and 

provides a high quality of pictures."27

Russia has also continued to operate the experimental small-size Monitor-E optoelectronic surveillance satellite, which uses panchromatic cameras (with a resolution of 

about 10 meters) and spectral-zone cameras (with a resolution of 22–24 meters) to fill 

commercial orders, according to Novosti commentator Yuri Zaitsev.28 

For military photoreconnaissance satellites, recent years have been very hard, with long 

gaps when no observation satellites of any kind were in orbit. Russia "periodically 

launches the Yenisey, Araks, Neman, and Oko heavy and medium optical reconnaissance 

satellites," noted journalist Viktor Myasnikov, who continued: 

But they were all developed in the last century and are distinguished by a 

short period of operation in orbit. And even then [they] do not always 

make it to the end. It is believed that all Russia's spacecraft, regardless of 
purpose—reconnaissance, meteorological, communications, and so 

forth—trail their American and European counterparts by two or three 

generations. And it is not a question of a lack of money but of backward 

scientific policy oriented toward instant impact, not the long-term 

development of new ideas.29

Russia intends to remedy that backwardness by promoting its global positioning system 

(GPS)-equivalent, GLONASS. But when it comes to commercial applications of an 

originally all-military project, they are running into structural hurdles. One basic problem 

was the espionage laws that, until January 1, 2007, made it illegal for Russian citizens to 

even know their true latitude and longitude to the accuracy that GLONASS can provide. 

Reporter Yuri Gavrilov described the spacecraft-specific problem in December 2006: 

The collapse of defense enterprises in the middle of the last decade and the 

relatively short lifespan of domestic satellites—around 3 years—have 

turned into serious problems in space. Today only 14 GLONASS satellites 

fly around the Earth; moreover, only 4 of them are new-generation 

satellites with an operating endurance of 7 years. Every satellite costs 

more than $10 million; its launch and operation require another $35 

million. It is clear that the military will not be able to cope with this task 

alone.30

"We hope we will have 18 spacecraft in orbit by late 2007–early 2008, and there will be a 

whole orbital group of 24 spacecraft by late 2009," he went on. Perminov said the main 

task now is "to create ground equipment for ordinary people so that they could enjoy the 

fruit of this space system." 31

Sergei Ivanov raised this theme at a conference at the St. Petersburg Institute of RadioNavigation and Time. He was there to consult with specialists on how to carry out the 

president's directive to accelerate the bringing of the dual-use navigation system online. 

According to the new program, both military and civilian users were to have access to 

GLONASS by the end of 2007. Civilian users are supposed to make up 80 percent of the 

users in the country. "Without being able to enter the market and provide citizens and 

their children with the opportunity of navigational support, as is already done, the system 

will not function as we want," Ivanov told reporters. "The very main thing is the 

influence of GLONASS on the socio-economic development of the country and 

providing it with greater transparency and less corruption." 32

Space analyst Yuri Zaitsev of Novosti, among others, has highlighted the flaw in the 

commercialization strategy—nobody in Russia is really making GLONASS receivers for 

public purchase: 

Unfortunately, the system's ground segment still leaves a lot to be desired. 

Starting on January 1, 2007, all restrictions on the purchase and use of 

GPS receivers will be lifted all over Russia, but batch production of them 
has not yet been launched. Moreover, electronic maps of all of Russian 

territory will only be compiled by late 2007. Consequently, commercial 

use of the global positioning system for civilian purposes is still out of the 

question.33

Zaitsev has indicated another reason for skepticism that Moscow's top-down approach to 

motivating potential private GLONASS users will ever work. Two decades earlier, the 

Soviet Union teamed up with Western countries in deploying orbital transponders to 

enable search and rescue for downed aircraft (SARSAT, or "search and rescue satelliteaided tracking"). Hundreds of thousands of such beacons have been installed on Western 

aircraft and boats, but as recently as 2006, Zaitsev notes, only "a few hundred" SARSATcompatible beacons had ever been installed on Russian vehicles of all types, and many of 

them probably are no longer functioning. 

Resumption of Science Missions 

Zaitsev pointed out that although "unfortunately, no full-fledged scientific satellites have 

been launched in Russia this year," Russian scientists still were able to utilize science 

data from their instruments aboard other space probes. Also, in exchange for providing a 

launch vehicle, "they have priority rights for the use of 25 percent of observation time 

aboard the International Gamma Ray Astrophysics Laboratory, which has enabled them 

to find out the nature of the cosmic microwave background radiation spread evenly 

throughout the Milky Way galaxy." 34 Still, this led to widespread complaints from within 

Russia's space science community. 

But this may soon change, since the Russian Space Agency has added budget line items 

for future missions. Russia's Lavochkin Bureau, which built the Soviet lunar and 

planetary probes of the early space age, now has government contracts for nine deepspace probes. 

In 2007, the first of these, a Spektr observatory with a 12-meter-diameter dish antenna, 

was to have been launched into high Earth orbit, but it has been delayed. Russia is also 

dusting off (and replacing lifetime-expired components in) an already mostly built 

payload called RadioAstron. It will be followed by Spektr-UF, which will carry an 

ultraviolet telescope with 20 times the sensitivity of Hubble's instruments into a very high 

orbit that allows continuous observations with much-reduced Earth interference. A space 

infrared observatory named Millemetron has also been approved for launch by 2015. It 

will use a cryogenically-cooled 12-meter-diameter mirror that will be deployed after 

launch into a high Earth orbit. 

A Spektr payload devoted to X-ray astronomy, formerly called Spektr-Roentgen-Gamma, 

has been folded in with similar European projects and now carries the ungainly title 

Spektr-RG/eRosita/Lobster. The payload will be carried into a low equatorial orbit by a 

Soyuz-2 booster to be launched from Kourou. 
Several planetary missions have been funded, the first in more than a decade. The FobosGrunt 3-year round-trip mission, scheduled to begin in 2009, will leave a long-lived 

Russian-built science orbiter near Mars, along with a Chinese hitchhiker beacon. The 

probe is expected to be followed in 2011–2012 by a set of small Mars surface landers. 

And a Moon orbiter called Luna-Glob has been contracted with a Moscow geochemistry 

institute that has been out of the lunar science business for almost 30 years. The probe 

will search for lunar polar ice 35 and will detect gravitational irregularities to help map the 

Moon's internal structure. 

A probe named Intergeliozond has also been approved for an attempt to reach nearer the 

Sun's surface than any previous space mission. After a Venus swing-by, the probe's 

perihelion would be 42,000,000 kilometers away, and further fly-by maneuvers will cut 

that distance in half, and ultimately even far lower. An ion drive will also twist the orbital 

plane until it passes over the solar polar regions. 

The Soviet Union's greatest deep-space successes were with its missions to Venus, and 

they will be resumed by a probe called Venera-D that will orbit the planet conducting 

remote observations. Serious studies have resumed for a long-lifetime Venus surface 

mission, but no formal project has been approved so far. 

Manned Program and Vehicles 

Soyuz Manned Spacecraft 

Introduced 40 years ago, the Soyuz has undergone numerous modifications and upgrades. 

Most significantly, an entirely new generation of Soyuz has been officially approved for 

introduction in 2011–2012. This project clearly indicates that follow-on human space 

vehicles (for example, the Kliper project) are much further away. 

The new Soyuz will be designed with a flight control system making one-man operation 

the norm so that two nonprofessional passengers can be carried safely. Major hardware 

changes will be made in the craft's service module and other systems in the command 

module. It will double the current 180-day on-orbit dwell capability. It will also be 

capable of being manufactured in a lunar variant, including a stronger heat shield, 

thermal control system, and longer-range communications capabilities. These options are 

nominally in support of a serious offer to make a commercial circumlunar mission for 

space tourists—but at a price of $400 million for two seats. 

Sharing many basic systems with Soyuz is the robotic supply craft called Progress. 

Introduced 30 years ago for use with Salyut and Mir space stations, the vehicle has seen 

more than 100 missions, every one of which has succeeded (occasionally on the second, 

and once on the third, docking attempt). It delivers about 2,300 kilograms of payload to 

the space station. 

Utilization and Expansion of International Space Station 
Russia plans to double production of Soyuz and Progress vehicles in 2009 to support a 

six-person crew on the International Space Station (ISS) and to transport U.S. personnel 

in the period after shuttle retirement but prior to the beginning of Orion missions—

perhaps 5 years or longer. The National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) 

has agreed to a Soyuz launch price of $65 million (three seats) and will purchase seats for 

cash during this period. A contract for services worth more than $800 million was signed 

early in 2007. 

In late 2006, the design for Russia's next add-on ISS module, called the Multipurpose 

Laboratory Module, was finalized. Originally intended to be basically a rebuilt spare 

Functional Control Block module in storage at the Khrunichev plant (like the unit that 

served as the base of the initial ISS orbital assembly), it now will utilize more control 

systems provided by Energiya-RCC (based on their Yamal bus) in order to reduce the 

space allocated to equipment that is applicable only to the initial rendezvous and docking 

phase. This will double the available volume for scientific equipment.36 The unit will be 

docked to one of the side-facing service module ports sometime in 2009–2010. Another 

module will provide a fourth docking port to support the higher traffic rates. 

Russia plans to support and help operate the ISS through at least 2020. But it remains to 

be seen whether the scientific returns from its participation will have any more impact on 

Russian industrial technology than did the ambitious program of orbital research in the 

1980s—that is, zero. 

It is just as likely that Russia sees its ISS role as dues for membership in the high-status 

club of top world spaceflight players. It is also relatively cheap insurance that the 

massively profitable foreign space sales activities will continue without interference by 

the governments of the United States and the European Union. 

Kliper 

Supporting the theory that Russia's main space efforts are aimed at securing additional 

foreign funds is the recent history of the much-touted Kliper six-person spacecraft. 

Officials have stated that it has been "approved for development" in the years after the 

Soyuz upgrade becomes operational, but significant design work is now being redone, 

and the hoped-for European and Japanese funding has not yet materialized. 

The deputy chief of Roskosmos, Viktor Remishevsky, acknowledged in October 2006 

that "this is the next stage in developing a manned space ship, and that Roskosmos had 

issued an RFP [request for proposal] for the spacecraft, but then withdrew it." He added 

that the Russian Space Agency had concluded that the budgetary funds allocated (about 9 

billion rubles through 2015, of which 500 million are available by 2010) would not be 

sufficient to create a six-seat space ship that can fly to the Moon or to a space station, fly 

from Plesetsk, land on runways, and perform other required functions. Additional 

nonbudgeted funds are needed to realize the project—tens of billions of rubles—and 

there were no longer any credible sources of such financing. 
In addition, the design teams had settled on a spacecraft that would weigh between 13 

and 14 tons, and there is no man-rated booster available. The Angara-3 could do it in 

theory, but it has been so often delayed that officials were unwilling to fund and develop 

a manned spacecraft in the hope that the new booster would be done on time.37

After years of seeking subsidies and cooperation from European space agencies, Moscow 

in 2009 formally approved a fully domestically funded follow-on manned spacecraft with 

requirements very similar to NASA's Orion program. An upgraded Soyuz booster was 

also selected for the new vehicle, bypassing the Angara program entirely. 

Ground Simulations 

Another human spaceflight project that looks more like a foreign funding magnet than a 

serious scientific effort is a planned 500-day isolation study with six volunteers 

simulating a Mars mission. In 2007, facilities were developed at the Institute for Medical 

and Biological Problems in Moscow for an exercise, pending receipt of enough European 

money (and crew volunteers). Past isolation studies have had mixed results (at best) and 

produced no significantly usable operational or medical insights, but this project began 

short- and medium-term simulations in 2008–2009 with significant European 

participation and funding, with the 500-day mission delayed into 2010. 

The Parom Ferry 

There are also some commercially feasible proposed Russian spacecraft that might well 

be worthy of outside funding. Probably the most attractive is the small space tug called 

Parom that has been designed based on existing space hardware to substitute for one of 

the major capabilities of the soon-to-grounded NASA space shuttle—its ability to bring 

large cargoes (structural elements, supplies) gently to the space station. 

It is useful to do a more detailed treatment of the Parom project because it is a good 

example of Russian space engineers playing to their strengths and providing specific, 

critical services to international space activities. As such, it is an illustrative case study in 

the ways that Russia can successfully exploit and build upon its existing strengths. 

With the approaching irrevocable grounding of the space shuttle fleet, space planners 

must face the need to replace piecemeal as many of its capabilities as possible. And as the 

construction of the International Space Station has demonstrated, a key ability is not just 

to carry payloads into orbit, but also to accurately bring them to a desired point in space 

and attach them to a structure already there. 

Without the shuttle acting as such a carrier, each payload designed to visit a space station 

must have its own navigation, guidance, control, and mating hardware. That hardware, 

and the power systems and propellant tanks to feed it, often can outweigh the deliverable 

payload on every launch and then often gets in the way of operations once the delivery 

has been performed. 
Now the Russians have proposed building the Parom, a specific spacecraft that promises 

to perform these tasks efficiently (and to use another critical word again, gently—a trait 

that makes building the payloads much easier). Functionally, it is the full equivalent of 

the harbor tugs in major Earthside ports. Cargoes without their own propulsion are towed 

to locations where they are wanted. The tugboat then moves on to another cargo, stopping 

occasionally for refueling and maintenance. 

The Parom that the Energiya Rocket and Space Corporation (Russia's manufacturer and 

operator of most human-related space vehicles) wants to build is a Soyuz-sized flying 

docking tunnel surrounded by propellant tanks, thrusters, solar cells, and avionics bays. It 

can dock in either direction, can thrust in either direction, and can be refueled repeatedly. 

Its components are to be designed for a 15-year lifetime involving up to 60 round trips 

between low orbit and the space station. 

The basic mission profile is simplicity itself. Based at a docking bay at the ISS (perhaps 

only an attach point with minimal interface with the station), it departs for a lower orbit 

when a station-bound cargo canister (or assembly component) is placed into a parking 

orbit by any of a number of launch vehicles. The cargo vehicle must have a simple endmounted mechanism for mechanical attachment and for short-term stabilization and 

power—nothing more sophisticated is needed. Parom approaches and docks to the cargo 

vehicle, and then pushes it up to the space station, where it docks its free end to a fully 

functional port. At that point, Parom's hatches can be opened and crewmembers can enter 

the cargo canister, if that is the mission. Or propellant can be fed through transfer lines 

into the station (and into Parom's own tanks, whenever needed). 

Alternately, the station's robot arm can grapple the payload, detach it from Parom, and 

place it where needed—perhaps in an assembly area or over a common berthing 

mechanism on the U.S. side that allows transfer of full-size science racks or other large 

cargoes. Or perhaps the payload can be delivered to applications not yet even imagined. 

Parom is to have the flexibility to accommodate practically anything that anyone can get 

into a parking orbit, up to a mass of 12 metric tons and possibly more than twice that. 

The range of delivery options made available by such a spacecraft is as wide as space 

itself. Parom could visit free-flying materials processing modules co-orbiting with the 

ISS, bringing them in for annual servicing and then redeploying them on its way out for a 

parking orbit pickup. Some Russian designs have Parom providing the space-to-space 

transport for the proposed Kliper follow-on human spacecraft, also still on the drawing 

board (and also awaiting funding from foreign partners). 

Parom-class tugs could carry satellites into higher orbits for deployment, or emplace and 

then retrieve co-orbiting science and industrial satellites near the ISS. They could operate 

autonomously in geosynchronous orbit and even around the Moon, carrying cargo 

canisters that include additional propellant supplies. In another application, ISS-based 

Paroms (and more than one may be stationed there once the Russians install additional 

docking ports) might be able to serve as emergency crew refuges, with portable 

consumables packages for life support. 
Practically all of the components of this Parom design have already been flight-tested. 

The structural framework is easy to build, and the power, control, approach, and docking 

systems would be outgrowths of existing Soyuz and Progress systems. Those avionics 

boxes that could not last 15 years can be designed for in-space changeout. 

Russia has twice used tugboat-style vehicles to bring components to a space station. For 

both the Kvant module (Mir, 1987) and the Pirs airlock module (ISS, 2001), the 

component was mounted atop a detachable propulsion module that later departed. In both 

cases, however, rendezvous guidance gear was installed on the station-bound component, 

not on the proto-tugboat that was the ancestor of the Parom design. 

In October 2006, Energiya president Nikolay Sevastyanov told a space conference, "We 

want to lower the cost of cargo supplies by a factor of four." His deputy chief designer, 

Nikolai Bryukhanov, had recently told reporters that "with consideration for the cost of 

the development and manufacture of the tug, the system will repay in less than two years 

of use"—clearly implying that customers would be expected to pay for the service. Once 

funding was approved, Bryukhanov promised the spacecraft could be ready in 5 years. 

The following month, Energiya's plan received the blessing of Russian Federal Space 

Agency head Anatoly Perminov, who touted its benefits at a press conference and 

announced plans to conduct its first flight within 3 years (it was not clear if this would be 

a test flight and proof of concept or the first fully operational vehicle). 

The plans are to phase out Progress flights soon afterward, although cargo canisters 

carrying 4 tons of supplies (instead of the 2.5 tons carried inside each Progress) would 

then be launched regularly for pickup by the operational Parom tug. How many would 

eventually be deployed remains unclear; but in the case of logistical support for a postshuttle space station, Parom could well be the answer to a worrisome problem. And the 

way that the spacecraft is developed, funded, and operated could be the general operating 

concept for Russia's expanded successes in space in years to come. 

Conclusion 

For the foreseeable future, Russia appears committed to internationalization of its main 

nonmilitary space activities, mainly as a crutch in obtaining services disproportionate to 

contributed resources ("For 5 percent of the investment we get 30 percent of the 

resources" is a frequent comment in justification of the space station partnership) and as a 

badge of major player status in the world. 

At the same time, Russia shows no signs of developing a capability for major innovation 

in spacecraft engineering or of demonstrating more than lip-service interest in quantum 

advances in space operations capabilities. Incremental progress has been the watchword 

for decades, usually not by choice but out of necessity because all previous attempts at 

breakout projects (human lunar flight, advanced robotic Mars probes, the Buran shuttle, 

the Polyus-Skif family of orbital battle stations) ended in humiliating frustration. 
Providing commercial launch services for foreign customers has provided 

multidimensional benefits to Russia. Beyond the significant cash flow, such activities 

fund booster upgrades and, in the case of converted military missiles, fund validation of 

lifetime extension efforts for still-deployed missile weapons. 

Military applications of space systems remain uninspired, with critical constellations 

(such as the missile early warning net) still significantly degraded and likely to remain so 

for many years. Russian officials have evidently decided that, despite any public 

posturings over U.S. military threats, there is essentially no prospect of actual hostilities 

in the foreseeable future and hence little pressure to reconstitute military space assets to a 

Soviet-era level. Russia retains a nuclear-armed operational antimissile system around 

Moscow that, if upgraded to hit-to-kill guidance, could provide significant antisatellite 

capability; it is also developing small robotic rendezvous spacecraft similar to U.S. 

projects that have potential antisatellite capabilities at any altitude into which they can be 

launched. 

Attempts at domestic commercialization of space-related services, including 

communications, navigation, and mapping, remain seriously—perhaps irremediably—

hamstrung by the recent resurgence of a traditional Russian top-down structure of 

authority. Bureaucrats are being ordered to implement wider use of space infrastructure, 

and after many years of rosy reports of progress, Moscow may realize that it is almost all, 

as usual, a sham. 

There is still little indication of successful exploitation of space discoveries and spacedeveloped technologies (what NASA and the Europeans call spin-offs) as a means of 

improving the technological skills of Russian industry. The space industry, as a 

component of the national defense industry, remains strictly compartmentalized from 

Russia's civil economy, and the resurgence of broad espionage laws (and several recent 

highly publicized convictions) will keep this ghettoization in force. This in turn may 

require other government measures, from patent purchase to industrial espionage, to 

acquire technologies that some Russian industries may already possess but are in practice 

forbidden to share internally. 

Russian space-related scientific and exploratory research, after hitting rock bottom a 

decade ago, is showing signs of a modest rebound. Russian space scientists may be able 

to resume making respectable contributions to the world scientific literature in the 

coming decade, another ticket to world-class status that spreads prestige to all of Russia's 

science reputation. 

But even if the main values of the Russian space program remain symbolic, these 

symbols have computable value to the nation's self-confidence and to the reputation of its 

technology—either for commercial export or as a reflection of the efficacy of its 

weapons. The modest but steady resource commitment to the space program reflects the 

government's assessment of the degree of value, now and in the foreseeable future. 
However, none of these intentions has much chance of success unless the Russians find a 

way out of the looming demographic crisis that mass mortality is confronting them with. 

In a society and an industry where monopolization of knowledge was power and sharing 

it often led to legal prosecution, behavior must change, and fast. This must be done so 

that space workers a decade from now, without the in-the-flesh guidance and advice of 

the old-timers, will be able to draw on their team knowledge that survived the passing of 

its original owners and was preserved in an accessible, durable form. The alternative is a 

return to the learning curve of more frequent oversights, mistakes, and inadequate 

problem solving of the dawn of the space age—with its daunting costs in time, treasure, 

prestige, and even human lives. 

Notes

1. Interfax-AVN, "Defense Industry Commission Discussing Space Industry Development Until 

2015," December 11, 2006. 

2. ITAR-TASS, December 23, 2006. 

3. Anatoly Perminov, Federal Space Agency news conference, December 26, 2006, op. cit. 

4. ITAR-TASS, "Russia Launches 10-year Space Program," July 18, 2005. 

5. ITAR-TASS, "Development of Space Rocket Industry Important—Ivanov," December 11, 2006. 

6. ITAR-TASS, "Government Commission Approves Rocket and Space Strategy Up to 2015," 

December 11, 2006. 

7. Perminov. 

8. Andrei Kislyakov, "Russia Faces Problems in Developing Space Technology," RIA-Novosti, 

December 11, 2006. 

9. Perminov. 

10. Ibid. 

11. Five-year plan budget citation. 

12. Perminov. 

13. Ibid. 

14. ITAR-TASS, "Russia's Angara Carrier Rocket to Be Flight Tested in 2010," December 11, 2006. 

15. ITAR-TASS, "Russia Far Eastern Cosmodrome to Remain in Place—Governor," December 29, 

2006. 

16. Perminov. 

17. Gennady Pulin, "State Priority: Fleet of 'Klipers' to be Created in Russia," VoyennoPromyshlennyy Kuryer, November 1, 2006. 

18. ITAR-TASS, "Ukraine Makes Platform for Brazlian Launch Center," October 16, 2006. 

19. Sergei Manstov, "Russian Launch Activity Ups a Gear," Nasaspaceflight.com, December 24, 

2006. 

20. Anatoly Zak, Russianspace.web.com. 

21. Interfax, "Flight Tests of Angara System to Start in 2010—Popovkin," December 11, 2006. 

22. Interfax-AVN, Moscow, September 19, 2006. 

23. "Strategy of Space Independence," Krasnaya Zvezda, December 13, 2006. 

24. "Space is Not Just for Tourists," interview with Anatoly Nikolayevich Perminov, Argumenty i 

Fakty, November 29, 2006. 

25. Perminov. 

26. Interfax, "Russia to Have Own Weather Satellites in Two Years—Chief Meteorologist," 

November 23, 2006. 

27. Perminov. 

28. Yuri Zaitsev, "Russia Set to Implement Ambitious Space Program," RIA-Novosti, December 19, 

2006, part I. 
29. Viktor Myasnikov, "A Satellite Is Now Space Junk," Nezavisimoye Voyennoye Obozreniye, 

December 1, 2006. 

30. Yuri Gavrilov, "Dual-Use Navigation," Rossiyskaya Gazeta, November 30, 2006. 

31. ITAR-TASS, "Russia Holds Talks on GLONASS with U.S., Europe, India, Others," December 5, 

2006. 

32. Gavrilov. 

33. Zaitsev. 

34. Ibid. 

35. Yuri Zaitsev, "Russia Set to Implement Ambitious Space Program," RIA-Novosti, December 20, 

2006, part II. 

36. ITAR-TASS, "Two Russian Companies to Build New ISS Module to Do More Research," 

December 4, 2006. 

37. Pulin. 
Chapter 23:

Russian Perspectives on Spacepower

Alexei Arbatov

Achievements in space exploration and utilization are that part of its Soviet heritage that 

the Russian Federation views with great pride and satisfaction. In 1957, the Union of 

Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR) was the first nation in the history of the world to put a 

satellite in space, and in 1961 it followed with the first manned space flight. During the 

Cold War, Soviet spacepower was second to none—in some respects behind and in others 

ahead of that of the United States. 

Since the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991, due to a protracted economic decline and 

depression, Russian space potential and activities have suffered greatly. The end of the 

Cold War added to this decline since during the decades of arms race and confrontation, 

Soviet space activities had been closely associated with military purposes and 

requirements. (In fact, the first Sputnik was a byproduct of the development of 

intercontinental ballistic missiles [ICBMs], which were needed to negate U.S. strategic 

nuclear superiority stemming from its geographic remoteness and forward-based aircraft 

and missile deployments in Europe and Asia.) 

After 1991, the sharp decline of the defense and space budgets and disintegration of 

scientific centers and industrial cooperation, exacerbated by the loss of assets of other 

former Soviet republics that were newly independent (the foremost being Ukraine, 

Belarus, Kazakhstan, and Tajikistan), led to a virtual collapse of Soviet spacepower. The 

only exception was the commercial space launching program, which largely utilized 

Soviet/Russian converted ICBMs retired from service (such as START–1, Dnepr, Zenit, 

and Rokot). This program provided at least some revenue that saved Russian spacepower 

from total demise during the 1990s. 

Nonetheless, by the beginning of the current decade, Russian space activities were badly 

undercut. Overall Russian space assets decreased 150 percent during the 1990s and in 

2004 consisted of 96 satellites (70 percent military and dual-purpose), of which 65 

percent were beyond service lifetime (33 military and 29 civilian and dual-purpose). The 

American space constellation consisted of 415 military and civilian satellites. The U.S. 

space budget ($16.4 billion) was 20 times bigger than Russia's ($0.8 billion). In contrast 

to the 12 or 13 U.S. radioelectronic and electronic-optical reconnaissance satellites, 

Russia had only 1 in orbit at any given time.1

Obsolete naval communication satellites Molniya-1T, Molniya-3, and Parus could not be 

replaced by the new Meridian-type craft due to shortage of funding. Out of eight needed 

missile attack early warning satellites (71X6 and 73D6), only three were in orbit. The 

Russian global navigation satellite system (GLONASS) consisted of only 14 instead of 
24 satellites, which were not enough even for the permanent coverage of Russian 

territory. Hence, Russian combat aircraft, including strategic bombers, had to rely on the 

U.S. analogous global positioning (NAVSTAR) space system. Likewise, the Russian 

Northern Fleet had to receive ice condition information from Canadian Radarsat-1 

spacecraft.2

During the last several years, Russian spacepower has been gradually recovering from the 

crisis. Presently there are 99 Russian satellites in space (70 percent military and dualpurpose). New vintage satellites were placed in orbit (Meridian, new type early warning, 

communication, and reconnaissance systems), and the number of GLONASS satellites 

was increased to 17. New space launchers are under intensive development (Angara, 

START–1, Soyuz 2–1B). The Plesetsk space and missile launching range is undergoing 

broad modernization (for Angara and Soyuz 2–1B vehicles). With the Angara launcher, 

Plesetsk for the first time will be able to reach geostationary orbit and loft superheavy 

loads in space. Space Forces (a separate branch of the armed services) is withdrawing 

from Baykonur range (in Kazakhstan) and curtailing its assets at Svobodniy range (in the 

Far East) to a minimal scale. The personnel level presently is 50,000 military and 25,000 

civilians and is not being reduced any further. 3

Altogether, Russia (by joint efforts of Space Forces and Roskosmos) is conducting about 

25 space launches annually for its own needs. A new space command and control site 

was commissioned in Armavir to make up for the two sites left in Ukraine (Yevpatoria 

and Dunayevtzy). Missile early warning radars of the Missile-Space Defense (part of 

Space Forces) were modernized in Pechora, Irkutsk, Balkhash (Kazakhstan), and 

Lekhtusi (Belarus). A new rapid-deployment radar system was tested successfully near 

Saint Petersburg. In addition to the electro-optical space monitoring station in Nurek 

(Tajikistan), a new site was commissioned in Karachaevo-Cherkessia (North Caucasus).4

The Federal Space Program 

The Russian government sees spacepower as one of the most important attributes of 

authority and prestige of a nation in the world today. In fact, Moscow believes that a 

country cannot claim the status of great power without developed space assets and 

activities—both civilian and military. Space systems are interpreted in Russia as orbital 

groups of spacecraft and land-based command-control and information relay sites, as well 

as space launch ranges, launchers, and support infrastructure. In the course of the few last 

decades, those systems and facilities have become the most important—in some cases, 

the crucial—resource in supporting military, socioeconomic, commercial, and scientific 

activities of the world. 

The Federal Space Program approved in November 2005 envisions $12 billion in outlays 

until 2015. The program and other official directives postulate the following goals of 

Russian space activities: 

• expanding the commercial, economic, scientific, and defense usage of outer space 

• expanding international cooperation in the civilian exploitation of space 
• ensuring Russian access to outer space 

• preserving the Russian position at the cutting edge of space technological 

development. 

In order to achieve these goals, Russia must fulfill the following tasks: 

• maintenance and development of a modern and effective space constellation 

• deployment and exploitation of the Russian segment of the International Space 

Station (ISS) consisting of 5 modules (presently Russia is mostly engaged in 

transportation) 

• providing of Russian contribution in the COSPAS-SARSAT system (2 satellites) 

• development of advanced variable mission space launchers (Angara) and 

modernization of the existing ones (Proton, Soyuz-2) 

• maintenance of the civilian space range at Baykonur and civilian-military range at 

Plesetsk 

• improvement of the quality of satellites (extending maximum service lifetime 

from 2 years to 10–12 years) 

• reforming space industries (presently consisting of 112 enterprises and 250,000 

employees to be concentrated in 3 or 4 holdings) 

• further increasing Russia's share in the world commercial space launch market 

(presently 40 percent, compared to 30 percent for the United States, 16 percent for 

China, 6 percent for the European Union, and 2 percent for India). 

International Cooperation 

Russia is heavily dependent on international cooperation in space exploration and 

exploitation, both as a donor and as a recipient, as well as a delivery service manager. 

Presently approximately 180 countries participate in space activities in some way. At 

least 40 of these are associated with the use of outer space information and support for 

military systems and forces, and 19 nations have scientific and industrial potential for 

manufacturing their own spacecraft. In various orbits, there are currently more than 700 

space satellites of civilian, military, and dual purpose types, among those about 400 

American and 100 Russian, including the International Space Station. 

By the level of budget allocation, Russia is lagging far behind the leading spacefaring 

nations. The United States is firmly in first place, followed by the European Union 

(through the European Space Agency [ESA]), Japan, China, Russia, and then India. At 

the same time, the space plans and ambitions of Russia, and its remaining scientificindustrial potential and infrastructure, are much greater than its current budgets would 

imply. 

Hence, Russia has a major interest in expanding its role in international space 

cooperation. Furthermore, Russia's role in world trade is much too dependent on its 

export of raw natural resources, which is characteristic of developing countries. Besides 

trade in arms and nuclear materials and technologies, cooperation in space activities is 

one of very few high-technology export items that Russia can pursue in the near- to mid-
term future. That is why this trade channel is so important to Russia both from the angle 

of status and prestige and in view of the revenues it brings to its underfunded space 

programs and assets. 

For Russia, the most valuable international projects are the following: 

• the International Space Station, with the United States and many other foreign 

states (Canada, Japan, and 17 member-states of the ESA) 

• COSPAS-SARSAT 

• a big unfolding space antenna (Roskosmos and Energiya with ESA and Italy) 

• microsatellites (150 kilograms) for Earth sounding (Roskosmos with EADSAstrium) 

• advanced Manned Transportation System (based on modernized Soyuz launch 

vehicle for orbital and Moon flights) 

• cooperation with ESA and France on the launching complex for Soyuz 2–1T from 

Kourou space range in French Guiana 

• cooperation with ESA and India on new space navigation systems 

• long-term international projects of flights to Mars and Venus.5

Russia's attitude to recipient nonspace nations in the Middle East, East-South Asia, and 

Latin America is motivated by commercial and political interests. Moscow's cooperation 

with spacefaring nations is a combination of the donor-recipient model. The main 

partners are ESA (foremost France, Italy, and Germany), the United States, Japan, China, 

India, Ukraine, Belarus, Kazakhstan, and Brazil. 

In addition, Russian willingness to provide launch and satellite services to some states is 

motivated by its interests, which initially shaped its 1999–2000 proposals on the global 

system of control over missile and missile technology nonproliferation. That initiative 

was formally introduced at the 2000 Non-Proliferation Treaty review conference and 

envisioned provision of space services to states refraining from developing their own 

missile capabilities and abiding by the Missile Technology Control Regime.6

Military Space Requirements 

Russia's military space requirements and programs are different from those of the United 

States. Having very limited, if any, conventional long-range power-projection capability 

(or long-range precision-guided weapons), Russia does not heavily rely on space systems 

for its conventional operations. Only reconnaissance and communications systems are of 

some value. In contrast to the USSR, Russia's faraway naval deployments are not 

conducted on a permanent basis, except when on infrequent naval exercises. 

As for strategic forces, Russia deploys only 1 or 2 ballistic missile submarines at sea at 

any given time, and its heavy and middle-range bombers fly only during rare exercises. 

These would surely benefit from better space communication and navigation capabilities, 

but those capabilities are not crucial. 
However, Russia's dependence on missile early warning satellites is truly decisive. Due 

to financial problems and mistaken decisions on a strategic modernization program in 

2000–2001, Russian strategic forces are becoming more vulnerable. Russia's ever smaller 

number of submarines and bombers is not survivable in bases and on airfields. Its mobile 

missile force is shrinking because many more obsolete SS–25 ICBMs are withdrawn than 

new SS–27s are deployed. Its silo-based ICBMs (including new SS–27s) and fewer 

mobile SS–27s in shelters increasingly depend on launch-on-warning (LOW) to maintain 

deterrent capability. On top of all this, out of eight big missile early-warning radars, five 

are deployed outside of Russian territory (in Belarus, Ukraine, Azerbaijan, and 

Kazakhstan) and cannot be relied upon in time of a hypothetical crisis involving a 

strategic nuclear threat. 

Russian official and unofficial attempts from 2001 to 2005 to come to an agreement with 

the United States to cut strategic forces to lower than 1,700 to 2,200 warhead levels 

(Moscow 2002 Strategic Offensive Reduction Treaty) to reduce U.S. counterforce 

capability, or to jointly lower the readiness for launch status of strategic forces (for the 

same purpose), proved to be futile. 

Hence, Russia has a heavy and growing reliance on the LOW concept and early warning 

satellites. The fact that this system does not have a much higher priority in Russia's space 

and defense program reflects Moscow's relaxed attitude toward the probability of a 

confrontation with the United States and its allies and a huge lack of coordination in 

Moscow's strategic forces, programs, posture, and support systems. Nonetheless, it is not 

an acceptable justification: strategic posture is such an important element of national 

security that internal contradictions are not to be looked at with complacency. 

Development and deployment of space weapons, particularly those of antisatellite class, 

would greatly exacerbate this instability against the background of the U.S., Russian, and 

potentially Chinese strategic postures. 

All in all, it may be stated flatly that Russia has great interests and ambitions in outer 

space, both civilian and military, but those interests are confined to unarmed craft. This 

position stems from both Russia's overwhelming dependence on international cooperation 

in outer space and the severe shortage of funding for defense in general and military 

space programs in particular. 

Hence, Russia has an extremely negative view of development and deployment of space 

weapons of any kind (deployed in space or designed for attacking space objects). In 

contrast to the USSR, which was the first nation to deploy operational ballistic missile 

defense (BMD) and antisatellite (ASAT) systems in the 1970s, Russia has neither the 

resources nor the perceived strategic requirements for pursuing space weapons. Russia 

would see any such development and deployment as a major provocation and a threat to 

its security and national interests. Moreover, Russia's future attitude toward other states 

and their treatment as partners or opponents will be heavily affected by their posture with 

respect to space weapons. In this sense, new U.S. Air Force space doctrine and various 

Pentagon statements on the subject are universally seen in Russia with great concern and 

hostility. 
Only some major provocation might change Russia's policy on the issue. One is a 

potential U.S. deployment of space-based ASAT systems, threatening Russian earlywarning satellites (which are deployed not only at geosynchronous orbits but also partly 

at Molniya-type highly elliptical orbits and pass at low altitude over the south polar 

zone). As a system for retaliation or for a direct attack on U.S. space-based ASAT craft, 

Russia might contemplate reviving its direct ascent ASAT systems or resuming its landbased laser program with inherent antisatellite potential. 

Another trigger may be a massive U.S. deployment of space-based BMD intercept or 

support systems, which would threaten Russia's strategic nuclear deterrent capability. 

Undoubtedly, Moscow's first choice in both cases would be an asymmetric response: 

enhancing satellite survivability, reducing reliance on LOW, or developing BMD 

penetration systems. However, if that would not be enough or turn out to be too 

expensive, Russia may eventually go for space weapons of its own. 

ASAT Systems 

Apart from routine commercial competition and disputes around places in geostationary 

orbit and radio communication frequencies, the real conflicts in space may stem from 

attacks on or interference with another state's spacecraft. 

In many cases, some violation of the standard operation of an individual space system 

may result in almost-total failure of the normal functioning of military, commercial, and 

other systems and structures. The hypothetical deployment of the means of destruction or 

interference of various physical natures, threatening spacecraft operations (foremost, that 

of early warning satellites) may in a crisis situation lead to a high level of strategic 

instability, encouraging reliance on a preemptive nuclear strike. 

At the same time, a significant escalation in the number of some types of reconnaissance 

satellites could undercut the survivability of certain strategic forces (primarily groundmobile missiles and missile submarines at sea) and devalue their deterrent capability, thus 

putting a premium on a first disarming strike or launch-on-warning—thus also leading to 

dangerous strategic destabilization. Both such satellites and orbital antisatellite systems 

provide a high incentive for the development of antisatellite weapons of various basing 

modes. Such is one of the most significant facets of the dialectics of strategic space 

systems interaction. 

Apart from a number of research and development projects of the United States and the 

Soviet Union in the 1950s and early 1960s, the first ASAT system was developed and 

deployed by the Soviet Union. It was a co-orbital satellite-killing vehicle guided by radar 

and infrared sensors developed in the Kometa design bureau. The launcher was a 

modified SS–9 (RS–36) and SS–18 (RS–36M) heavy ICBM system. The first test in 

space was conducted in 1968, and tests continued until 1982. Several launchers were 

deployed at Tyuratam (Baykonur) space range in 1979. The Soviet ASAT was capable of 

intercepting satellites at altitudes of up to 1,000 kilometers, but it was a slow action 

system with dubious effectiveness. When the United States responded with its own 
ASAT system based on the F–15, Moscow changed its position and came forward with 

the proposal of a bilateral moratorium on ASAT testing, which was turned into a 

unilateral moratorium in 1983, observed by the USSR/Russia since then. 

There is some evidence that Russia experimented with a direct-access ASAT system 

similar to the American one and based on the MiG–31 fighter-interceptor, and prepared 

to deploy some direct-access SS–19 (Ur-100UTTX)–based ASAT systems at Svobodniy 

test range. But neither was ever tested or deployed. The Soviet first-generation A–35 

Moscow BMD system, deployed in the 1970s, had some collateral ASAT capabilities, as 

does the follow-on A–135 system presently deployed. However, both rely on nuclear 

intercept; hence, their effect would be suicidal for Russia's own satellites. 

The history of negotiations on space (including antisatellite weapons) in the 1980s proved 

the great difficulty of creating treaty-based limitations on space systems. Currently, for a 

number of reasons, the political and international law environment (foremost, a collapse 

of the 1972 ABM Treaty after U.S. withdrawal in 2002) for such negotiations and 

agreements is even less favorable, despite the end of the Cold War 15 years ago. In fact, 

the U.S. Ground Based Interceptor (GBI)–type BMD system under deployment is already 

an effective ASAT system for destroying satellites at up to 1,500 kilometers altitude. The 

only thing missing is a global deployment to provide for fast interception at various orbits 

and testing against a target satellite. 

Defining Space Weapons 

Besides political and strategic obstacles to effective negotiations on space weapons, there 

are legal problems with the definitions of such systems. It seems that the preferable 

definition is as follows: space weapons are means of destruction and disruption of 

functioning of space objects, specifically developed and tested for this purpose in any 

basing mode; and means of destruction of any target of any location, if such means are 

developed and tested for deployment at Earth orbits (that is, designed to perform at least 

one revolution around the Earth). Hence, space weapons are distinguished either by their 

designated targets (space objects) or by their own basing mode (at Earth orbit). 

A simpler and less strict definition of space weapons could be a weapons system (means 

of destruction) that is a space object or is designed to destroy space objects. However, 

many types of weapons or destruction systems have multiple uses, and their development, 

testing, and deployment cannot be directly limited by international treaties. These types 

include, for example, laser, kinetic, electromagnetic, particle beams, and other weapons 

of similar type (except nuclear weapons, which are prohibited from being deployed in 

space, albeit without verification procedures, by the 1967 Outer Space Treaty and from 

being tested by the 1963 Partial Test Ban Treaty). 

Many systems, intended for other missions—offensive ballistic missiles of various types 

if fused for space burst, fractionally orbital bombardment systems, maneuverable 

satellites, and manned spacecraft—may have collateral capabilities to destroy space 

objects. 
Of particular importance are strategic antiballistic missile systems of any type of 

deployment (basing mode) that have implicit antisatellite potential, especially against 

low- and medium-altitude (up to 1,500 kilometers) satellites. It might be possible to only 

impose a ban on testing strategic antimissile systems against space objects, somewhat 

limiting their combat effectiveness in this role. Such limitation would be ineffective 

against nuclear antimissile interceptors, although the United States does not develop or 

deploy such systems, while Russia has a limited number around Moscow with lowaltitude range. U.S. interceptors of GBI type designed to hit missiles at mid-course 

multiple independently targetable reentry vehicle–dispensing phase would be 

theoretically able to use the same guidance systems against satellites at low- to midaltitude orbits. Still, some dedicated tests against satellites would probably be needed to 

be sure of their effectiveness for such missions. 

To bolster responsibilities of spacefaring nations and to formalize the bounds of those 

responsibilities, it might be possible as a first step to develop and voluntarily accept a 

code of conduct in space activities (CoCSA). Its goal would be to ban activities aimed at 

destroying or interfering with the functioning of space systems, as well as constraining 

development, deployment, and use of weapons systems intended for such actions. 

This kind of ban would naturally operate under peacetime conditions, but it may lower 

the technological and operational capabilities of states for destabilizing actions (and 

consequently for triggering uncontrolled escalation) under conditions of crisis or even 

armed conflict. Some of its regulations could be adhered to even in times of war (in a 

manner similar to the non-use of chemical weapons in World War II). The CoCSA would 

have to impose a ban on testing, development, and employment of all means of 

destruction of space objects, on means of disrupting their functioning, as well as of all 

weapons (means for destroying targets) of space-basing mode (that is, deployed on Earth 

orbits). As a code, it would not need a refined verification system, counting rules, or 

limitation definitions. Its effectiveness would be mostly political as an agreement on 

intent, but it still would have a marginal utility (like The Hague Code of Conduct with 

respect to missile nonproliferation). 

In the longer term, under favorable political and strategic circumstances, the CoCSA 

could become important as a basis for legally binding agreements, which would 

capitalize on its most important and practical points and depend on availability of 

tangible definitions and verification capabilities.

Notes

1. V. Miasnikov, Nezavisimoe Voennoe Obozrenie, December 18, 2005. 

2. Ibid. 

3. I. Marinin, Space News, April 3, 2007. 

4. Interview of Space Forces Commander V. Popovkin, Space News, April 3, 2007. 

5. Briefing, A. Perminov, September 12, 2006, accessed at <www.oborona.ru.13.09.2006>. 
6. A. Pikaev, "A Global Control System: Too Comprehensive?" available at 

<www.ceip.org/files/Publications/Pikaev.2001>. 
Chapter 24:

Spacepower in China

Dean Cheng

For the purposes of this volume, spacepower has been variously defined as: 

• the ability of a state or nonstate actor to achieve its goals and objectives in the 

presence of other actors on the world stage through exploitation of the space 

environment1

• the pursuit of national objectives through the medium of space and the use of 

space capabilities2

• the total strength of a nation's capabilities to conduct and influence activities to, 

in, through, and from space to achieve its objectives. 3

This view of space is paralleled in the 2006 Chinese white paper, "China's Space 

Activities in 2006." This paper, issued by China's State Council, the highest 

governmental body in the People's Republic of China (PRC), notes that a key principle 

underlying the development of China's space industry is that it is "a strategic way to 

enhance its economic, scientific, technological, and national defense strength, as well as a 

cohesive force for the unity of the Chinese people."4

Indeed, insofar as the People's Republic of China is concerned, China has been interested 

in spacepower—the use of space and space-related activities in support of national 

goals—since 1956. In that year, Qian Xuesen helped found China's aerospace industry, 

and that date is considered by Chinese historians and policymakers as marking the start of 

China's space program. 

This chapter examines China's space capabilities in the context of their role in support of 

furthering national objectives. It begins with a brief historical overview of the Chinese 

space program. It then provides a survey of China's space capabilities as of 2007 and 

assesses the contributions of space to China's national interests and objectives. 

Historical Development of China's Space Program 

When the People's Republic of China was founded in 1949, China had been at war almost 

continuously, either internally or externally, since the early 1930s. This near-continuous 

state of war had not only wrought massive devastation over much of China, but also had 

sapped China's intellectual base and destroyed much of its limited industrial foundation. 

To remedy this, Mao Zedong and other top leaders placed high priority on developing the 

country's scientific and technological capabilities. 
The intent was to facilitate the strengthening of China's economy and its technological 

and industrial base, and, just as important, foster the development of an indigenous arms 

industry. From the outset, it was envisioned that China would develop the ability to 

manufacture the accoutrements of a major power: nuclear weapons, missiles, and 

satellites. Mao saw this as essential for reducing China's vulnerability to external 

aggression and pressure, because "in today's world, if we don't want to be bullied, we 

must have these things."5

A key component of this effort would be the development of an aeronautics industry. 

Airpower had proven essential in World War II, and aviation was seen as a hallmark of 

advanced science and technology. Consequently, the Chinese leadership felt that both 

national security and prestige required the development of a Chinese aeronautics 

industry. Two key individuals helped to shepherd its development: Professor Qian 

Xuesen and Marshal Nie Rongzhen. 

Qian Xuesen, an American-trained physicist who had worked at what became the Jet 

Propulsion Lab and with Theodore von Karman, in 1955 joined the larger wave of 

Chinese scientists returning to "help build a new China." Qian was and remains a 

controversial figure. At the time, he was accused of being a communist, and U.S. 

authorities delayed his return to China for fear that he might bring back information with 

him to help the Chinese communist regime. 

Soon after his return, Qian forwarded "A Proposal to Establish China's Defense Aviation 

Industry" to the senior Chinese leadership, calling for the creation of an aerospace 

industry that would design and build not only aircraft, but also rockets and missiles. This 

proposal was incorporated into the "National Long-Term Plan for the Development of 

Science and Technology, 1956–1967," which provided a broad blueprint for PRC efforts 

to develop their scientific and technical capabilities. Also incorporated into the plan were 

projects to develop nuclear energy, as well as jet and rocket technology.6

As part of the plan, the Fifth Research Academy of the Ministry of National Defense was 

established, with Qian at its head. This academy was responsible for missile 

development. Chinese histories of the country's space, missile, and strategic weapons 

programs generally start with the founding of the Fifth Academy. 

Qian's ideas aligned neatly with those of Marshal of the People's Liberation Army (and 

later Vice Premier) Nie Rongzhen. Nie, a compatriot of Mao Zedong and Deng Xiaoping, 

was not only a senior member of the People's Liberation Army (PLA), but also a major 

promoter of science and technology. In the wake of the massive casualties incurred by 

Chinese forces in the Korean War, Nie, along with several other senior PLA leaders, 

recognized that simply relying on massed forces against a more technologically advanced 

opponent (as represented by the United Nations forces) was insufficient.7 Nie noted that 

"since the Korean War, we have often been disturbed by the point [that] we lagged far 

behind the then-enemy in military technologies."8
Nie believed that only by developing its scientific and technical industrial base could 

China build up both its military power and overall Chinese capabilities, what is now 

often referred to as "comprehensive national power." Nie believed that it was essential for 

the PRC to pursue the broad development of such capabilities if it was going to compete 

not only militarily but also economically and politically with the other major powers. 

Consequently, he and Qian may be considered the key movers responsible for China's 

strategic weapons, missile, and space efforts. 

Nie's and Qian's interests converged, as Nie oversaw the Aviation Industrial Commission, 

which had control over Qian's Fifth Academy. Nie, in turn, reported directly to the 

Central Military Commission, the highest level of authority for the PLA, and the 

Politburo of the Central Committee of the Chinese Communist Party. This is 

symptomatic of the high level of interest that space and strategic programs have 

consistently enjoyed from the earliest days of the PRC. Space also garnered the interest 

of the "Great Helmsman" himself, Mao Zedong. Chinese histories of their space program 

inevitably refer to the impact of the statement made by Mao in 1958 that "we must have 

satellites, too." 9

Turmoil and Self-Reliance 

Even the interest of Mao Zedong was not enough to overcome the limitations of China's 

backward state. China had neither the trained manpower nor the industrial base to support 

what was, in the 1950s, cutting edge research into spaceflight. Worse, the situation was 

exacerbated by the nationwide turmoil sparked by Chinese political upheavals. The first 

major disruption was the Great Leap Forward. This was one of Mao's early efforts to

showcase the achievements of China under communism, and one of the great tragedies of 

the 20th century. The situation was so chaotic that even members of the nuclear, missile, 

and space development teams suffered from malnutrition. 

The situation was compounded by the Sino-Soviet split, which led to the withdrawal of 

Soviet experts, often leaving projects that were only half completed. With the split, 

Chinese leaders began to propound the "two bombs, one satellite" line, which called for 

indigenous development of an atomic bomb, a hydrogen bomb, and a satellite. The point 

was to underscore that the PRC could, by dint of its own efforts, manufacture the most 

advanced weapons and master the most cutting edge technologies on its own. This 

emphasis on indigenous development became a political rallying cry, and the line is still 

regularly invoked. 

The combination of limited industrial base and turmoil in domestic and foreign policies 

led to the deferral of space developments for nearly a decade. Once the Chinese had 

succeeded in developing their own nuclear deterrent, exploding an atomic bomb in 1964 

and a hydrogen bomb in 1967, however, the emphasis shifted back to developing China's 

space capabilities. Indeed, even as development of thermonuclear weapons was 

progressing, Qian Xuesen and Nie Rongzhen were pushing for a renewed satellite effort. 

In 1965, Nie's National Defense Science and Technology Commission submitted a 

"Report on the Development of Artificial Satellites," which called for making satellite 
development a priority. By May, the report had been incorporated into the state plan, and 

engineering development was begun on developing a satellite, Project 651. 10 As part of 

that effort, in 1968 the Party leadership established a Chinese Academy of Space 

Technology (CAST) with Qian as its dean. 

Once again, however, domestic politics interfered with China's space development 

efforts. In 1966, Mao Zedong initiated the Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution, and for 

the second time in a decade, China was plunged headlong into political turmoil. This 

included the space and missile programs. 

In order to insulate these efforts from the excesses of Red Guard interference, the Central 

Military Commission placed CAST under the National Defense Science and Technology 

Commission. In effect, the satellite program was placed in military hands. 11 Similarly, 

the military was made responsible for the construction of the satellite tracking, telemetry, 

and control systems essential for supporting satellite operations, and for the various 

launch sites. 12 Eventually, many of the key persons were also placed under military 

protection, including Qian Xuesen. 

Despite the chaos, the Chinese scientists were able to meet their goals. On April 24, 

1970, China's launched the Dongfanghong-1 (DFH–1), making the PRC only the fifth 

country to launch a satellite into orbit. As per Mao's instructions, the DFH–1 was both 

larger and more capable than the first-time satellites of either the United States or the 

Soviet Union. The satellite launch, coming 6 years after China's first atomic explosion 

and 3 years after China's first thermonuclear weapon, marked the culmination of the "two 

bombs, one satellite" effort. 

Ironically, it was the rise of Deng Xiaoping that probably saw the greatest cutbacks in the 

Chinese space program. With Deng's rise after the fall of the Gang of Four, he shifted 

focus from preparing for what Mao had termed "large war, early war, nuclear war," to the 

expectation that, for the foreseeable future, the keynote of the times would be "peace and 

development." Consequently, Deng set forth the general Chinese guideline of "civilmilitary combined, wartime-peacetime combined, give preference to military goods, have 

the civilian nurture the military." These guidelines, which remain a cornerstone of 

Chinese national development strategy, touted the conversion of the military-industrial 

base to a more civilianized one. For the Chinese space program, that shift meant 

declining resources, since there was much less pressing military concern for either 

missiles or space capabilities. 

This ambivalence toward the Chinese space program only lasted a few years, however, 

before there was renewed focus on its development. In March 1986, four major Chinese 

scientists approached Deng Xiaoping and pressed for a new commitment of resources 

toward science and technology (S&T). Three of the four scientists—Wang Daheng,13

Chen Fangyun,14 and Yang Jiachi15 (along with Wang Ganchang 16 )—were part of the 

aerospace program. They all emphasized that science and technology were essential for 

future economic and technological advances, and required significant outlays of both 
financial and political capital. Deng eventually approved, and Plan 863, formally termed 

the National High-Technology Research and Development Plan, was born. 17

This plan has served as a key blueprint for major research and development efforts into 

S&T and high technology in China, including not only aerospace, but also biology, 

information technology, robotics, and advanced materials. Plan 863 has been renewed 

with each subsequent Five-Year Plan and remains an ongoing effort to foster Chinese 

scientific and technical capabilities, including those in space. 

Chinese space efforts received further impetus with the collapse of the Soviet Union. The 

collapse served to provide China access to Soviet space technology, often at bargain 

prices. At the same time, by removing the strictures of the Cold War from the 

international space market, it provided an opportunity for new players, including China, 

to enter the global space market. This coincided with Chinese efforts to foster 

commercialization of its space industries; not surprisingly, China became a player in the 

international space launch market at this time. 

Current Chinese Capabilities 

Over the course of 50 years, the PRC has developed a robust space capability. It 

possesses multiple launch sites and produces not only its own launchers, but also a range 

of satellites. 

Organization 

The Chinese military has long had a role in space development. Construction of China's 

launch facilities, for example, was undertaken by the General Logistics Department, one 

of the four general departments that oversee all PLA activities. Until 1999, China's space 

program itself was overseen by the Commission on Science, Technology, and Industry 

for National Defense (COSTIND), which had authority over all military production in 

China. This included oversight of the nuclear, aviation, ordnance, and space ministries, as 

well as research, development, and production of certain high-technology items 

(including space). COSTIND, however, was not solely a military organization; it had 

influence over civilian science and technology (if only through its responsibilities for 

defense conversion) and reported directly to the State Council, as well as the Central 

Military Commission.18

A major reorganization in 1998, however, resulted in the restructuring of several key 

organizations overseeing China's space program. COSTIND's responsibilities were 

parceled out; responsibility for defense research, development, and acquisition was 

assigned to a new General Department, the General Armaments Department (also known 

as the General Equipment Department). The General Armaments Department is 

responsible for the construction and maintenance of Chinese space launch facilities.19

Defense industries, meanwhile, would be managed by a rump COSTIND, which would 

report only to the State Council. 20 Under this smaller COSTIND, a separate civilian 
space bureaucracy was established. The China National Space Administration (CNSA) 

has responsibility for space policy formulation and day-to-day program management. It 

manages two state-owned enterprises, China Aerospace Science and Technology 

Corporation (CASC) and China Aerospace Science and Industry Corporation (CASIC), 

each of which, in turn, oversees a group of smaller state-owned enterprises and 

corporations. 

CASIC oversees the China Jiangnan Aerospace Industry Corporation, China Sanjiang 

Aerospace Industry Corporation, and the China Haiyang Machinery and Electronics 

Technology Institute (formerly the Third Academy). Included under CASC oversight are 

the Chinese Academy of Space Technology (formerly the Fifth Academy), the China 

Academy of Launch Vehicle Technology, and the China Great Wall Industry 

Corporation. 21 CASC is the backbone of China's aerospace industries, manufacturing 

launch vehicles, satellites, and ground equipment. 

Launchers 

The primary Chinese launcher is the Long March series of rockets. Over the past 50 

years, the PRC has fielded some 14 versions of the Long March system, allowing it to 

cover the gamut from low Earth to geosynchronous to polar orbits. The primary variants 

of the Long March series currently in commercial service include: 

• CZ–2C, a two-stage rocket used for low Earth orbit, first launched in November 

1975 

• CZ–2D, a two-stage rocket used for two-stage orbit, first launched in August 1992 

• CZ–3A, a three-stage rocket. Using cryogenic fuel, it is capable of 

geosynchronous transfer orbit (GTO) with a payload of 2.6 tons. It was first 

launched in 1994. 

• CZ–3B, a three-stage rocket, with a GTO payload of 5.1 tons, first launched in 

1996 

• CZ–4B, a three-stage rocket used for polar/Sun-synchronous orbit. It was first 

launched in May 1999. 22

In addition, the Chinese use the Long March 2F for their manned space missions. This is 

a man-rated version of the CZ–2E, a CZ–2 core with four additional strap-on, liquidfueled boosters. 

Launch Sites and Mission Control 

To accommodate their various launchers, the PRC has constructed multiple launch sites, 

giving it, like the United States and Russia, the ability to launch multiple rockets at the 

same time. 

China's launch sites include: 
• the Jiuquan Satellite Launch Center in the Gobi Desert, which focuses on lowand medium-orbit satellites. Jiuquan also has been the site of all Shenzhou 

launches. Many CZ–2 launches are conducted here. 

• the Taiyuan Satellite Launch Center, in northern China, which is used for polar 

orbiting missions. Many CZ–4 launches are conducted here. 

• the Xichang Satellite Launch Center, in southwest China, which supports all 

Chinese launches destined for geosynchronous orbit. Many CZ–3 launches are 

conducted here. 

There have also been reports that the Chinese are building a new spaceport on Hainan 

Island. 

China's space missions are controlled and coordinated from near Xi'an in central China. 

The Chinese Tracking, Telemetry, and Control (TT&C) network controls five domestic 

ground stations, as well as four space-tracking ships, which provide the PRC with 

overseas tracking abilities. 

China has also signed agreements with Sweden, France, and Brazil to access space-track 

information from those nations. As part of a global network of TT&C facilities, the PRC 

has also established its first overseas bases in Namibia and Kiribati. In 2003, when 

Kiribati decided to recognize Taiwan, however, the PRC dismantled the station. The 

2006 Shenzhou-VI mission was supported by additional facilities in Malindi, Kenya, and 

Karachi, Pakistan.23 Interestingly, the PRC constructed a dedicated facility, the Beijing 

Aerospace Directing and Controlling Center (BADCC), to manage just its manned space 

flights. 

Satellites 

China fields a range of indigenously produced satellites, including communications, 

weather, Earth imaging/remote sensing, and navigation satellites. 

Communications satellites: Dongfanghong . The April 1984 launch of the DFH–2 made 

China only the fifth nation to independently launch a satellite into geosynchronous orbit. 

This was an experimental satellite with two transponders, which provided the basis for 

the subsequent DFH–2A series of communications satellites. The Chinese eventually 

fielded three DFH–2A satellites (out of four launched), each fitted with four 

transponders, allowing them to provide global, 24-hour, all-weather television 

broadcasting nationwide, as well as the capacity to handle 3,000 telephone calls 

simultaneously. 24 The DFH–2As replaced previously leased platforms and ended 

Chinese dependence upon foreign satellite providers. 

These were followed by the DFH–3, of which seven were in operation as of July 2005.25

The DFH–3 satellite had three-axis stabilization, providing a superior platform for its 24 

C-band transponders, including 6 that are 16 watt, used for television, and 18 that are 8 

watt, low-rate transponders for transferring telephone calls, telexes, and telegrams. They 

can transmit 6-channel color television programs and 15,000 telephone calls 
simultaneously (using frequency compression technology, they can transfer even more). 

The lifespan was projected for 8 years. The DFH–3 greatly alleviated the growing 

pressures on China's satellite communications infrastructure. This satellite also represents 

China's first communications satellite intended for civilian use. Twenty-two of its 24 

transponders are used by the Ministry of Posts and Telecommunications for public 

purposes, including support for provincial level communications and television 

broadcasts to various provinces, as well as providing nationwide commercial phone 

service. 26

Weather satellites: Fengyun (FY). In 1988, with the launch of the first FY–1A, China 

became only the third nation to launch its own meteorological satellites. As of this 

writing, the PRC has launched four FY–1 weather satellites into polar orbit (one of which 

is currently operational), and four FY–2 geosynchronous weather satellites (two of which 

are currently operational). 

The FY–1 series operates in the visible, thermal infrared, and near-infrared bands. It has 

been used to detect forest and grassland fires, as well as to predict areas likely to be 

affected by droughts or floods.27 The FY–1 also constituted a major step forward in 

Chinese efforts to promote international cooperation in space, as it became part of the 

World Meteorological Organization's constellation of weather satellites. 

The first FY–2 series satellite was launched successfully in 1997. The FY–2 series is 

equipped with three channels for visible light, infrared, and water vapor.28 It does not 

appear to have a very long operational life, functioning for only about 3 years (compared 

with the projected 8-year lifespan of the DFH–3).29

The FY–2 series made China one of only three nations with weather satellites operating 

in both geosynchronous and low Earth orbit at the same time. The FY–2C, launched in 

October 2004, also marked China's first commercial weather satellite. Chinese writings 

portray the FY–2C as representing China's entry into civilian aerospace and commercial 

satellite service.30

Recoverable remote sensing satellites: Fanhui Shi Weixing (FSW). The most numerous of 

China's satellites is the recoverable remote sensing satellite, with 22 launched through 

August 2005. The satellite drops its payload of either images or experiments back to 

China by directly firing solid retro-rockets when the craft is over China, descending 

almost vertically. The successful launch of an FSW series satellite in 1975 made China 

only the fifth country to be able to retrieve photographs from space. 

The nine FSW–0 subseries of missions were apparently aimed at photoreconnaissance. 

The five FSW–1 subseries appear to have carried a combination of Earth observation and 

microgravity experiment payloads, in some cases on the same mission. Less clear were 

the intended tasks for the three FSW–2 subseries or the five FSW–3 subseries of 

launches.31
Chinese analyses note that the FSW series is built upon the idea of evolutionary design 

and incremental improvements, in order to minimize risk. Nonetheless, over 30 years of 

service, the FSW has seen a steady increase in capability. According to Chinese writings, 

for example, the first-generation FSW satellites (apparently encompassing the FSW–0 

and FSW–1 subseries) had a lifespan of only 3 to 8 days. By 1992, however, the second 

generation (apparently encompassing the FSW–2 and FSW–3 subseries) had a lifespan of 

15 to 20 days. The data collected by a second-generation FSW was said to be 13 times 

that of a first-generation craft. Similarly, resolution was said to have improved by a factor 

of 3. 32

The FSW series is credited with making major contributions to Chinese agriculture by 

providing key materials for land use surveys, as well as providing for geodesy, mining 

surveys, waterworks construction, environmental monitoring, railroad line construction, 

and urban planning. 

Earth imaging/remote sensing satellites: Ziyuan (ZY). While the FSW series of satellites 

provided China with an initial photoreconnaissance capability, their limited lifespan, 

coupled with the need to return canisters of film, limited its utility. The PRC in the 1980s 

began to undertake joint research with Brazil to develop a more capable satellite. The 

result was the China-Brazil Earth Resources Satellites (CBERS), which is also referred to 

as the Ziyuan (Resource) Satellite. In October 1999, China launched CBERS–1, also 

known as ZY–1, from Taiyuan Launch Center. 

The ZY series has a design lifespan of approximately 2 years. It uses a set of digital 

electronic sensors, including a five-channel charge coupled device camera, an infrared 

multispectral scanner, and a wide-field imager, to gather pictures, which it then transmits 

to a ground station. 33 The sensors are believed to have a resolution of 20 meters. 

Interestingly, Chinese writings have noted that some of the ZY–1 series are also equipped 

with electronic counter-countermeasures for their control systems. 

In September 2000, October 2002, and November 2004, three ZY–2 satellites were 

launched. These are apparently in a lower orbit, with a perigee of 489 kilometers, 

compared with 773 kilometers for the ZY–1. While Chinese writings indicate that the 

ZY–2 series is primarily used for Earth resource observation, environmental monitoring 

and protection, urban planning, agricultural assessments, disaster monitoring, and space 

science experimentation, some Western writings have characterized the ZY–2 as a 

military reconnaissance system. 

Navigation satellite: Beidou. On May 25, 2003, China's Xichang Satellite Launch Center 

launched a Long March 3A rocket with the third Beidou satellite into orbit. The 

successful deployment of its payload made China only the third nation to field its own 

space-based navigation and positioning system. 

The Beidou system, unlike the global positioning system (GPS) or global navigation 

satellite system (GLONASS), is an active system, built around two geosynchronous 

satellites (the third is apparently an orbital spare). The user's terminal transmits a signal to 
the satellites, which in turn signal a separate ground station with the times that they each 

received the user's signal. The central station calculates the user's two-dimensional 

position based on the time difference, and then adds information from a digital database 

to obtain the user's third dimension. All of this is then transmitted back to the user. 

While the system is more cumbersome and has an upper limit on the number of users 

(due to the two-way communications requirements), from Beijing's perspective it also has 

certain advantages. Most obviously, of course, it is under direct Chinese control. 

Furthermore, since it requires launching only two satellites (GLONASS involved 21 

satellites, GPS requires 24, Galileo will involve 30), compared with global systems, it can 

be rapidly built and entails relatively low expenditures, yet still provides 10-meter 

services to a core region. The Beidou system can also serve as a communications system, 

in addition to satellite navigation and positioning. 

In addition to these main systems, the Chinese have also developed other capabilities. For 

example, in April 2006, China launched the first of what is expected to be a new series of 

remote sensing satellites, the Yaogan-1. Officially intended for scientific experiments, 

Earth resource observation, agricultural estimations, and disaster relief, it is part of 

China's efforts to develop the needed "24-hour, all-weather, all-aspect networked remote 

sensing capability."34

The Chinese have also devoted significant resources into developing small satellites, even 

developing a dedicated small-satellite launcher, the Kaituozhe. Such satellites would be 

potentially both cheaper and more resilient than larger satellites. One Chinese analysis 

concluded that employing larger numbers of much smaller satellites may also reduce 

overall vulnerability.35

The satellite most prominently mentioned in the Chinese press has been the Haiyang-1 

ocean surveillance satellite. Launched in May 2002, the Haiyang-1 weighs 368 kilograms 

and has visible light and infrared capabilities to monitor the ocean surface and observe 

changes in water temperature. It has a projected lifespan of 2 years. The main aim of this 

satellite is to provide Chinese scientists with oceanographic information, including data 

on ocean productivity, fishery stocks, and nutrient levels. It has the ability to examine 

light and water interaction and monitor algae levels, ocean surface water temperatures, 

sedimentation, and ocean pollution levels. It is also expected to measure littoral 

conditions, ocean currents, and ocean surface meteorological conditions. 

Manned Space 

In addition to satellites, China has launched manned missions into orbit. This was 

apparently a consideration from the early days of the Chinese space program, specifically 

with the founding of the Space Flight Medical Research Center by Qian Xuesen in 1968. 

While there was reportedly some interest in orbiting a man in a modified FSW capsule in 

the 1960s, Chinese manned space efforts really began in earnest in the 1990s. As with the 

rest of China's space program, the original Project 921 proposal for manned spaceflight 
called for indigenous development of a series of new rockets and new spacecraft over the 

course of the eighth and ninth Five-Year Plans (1991–1995 and 1996–2000, 

respectively). Although the program was not approved, construction was nonetheless 

started at that time on a new flight control center capable of handling manned spacecraft 

(which eventually became the BADCC). 

Then, in 1994, a cash-strapped Russia indicated its willingness to sell space expertise to 

China, and when Jiang Zemin visited the Russian Flight Control Center in Kaliningrad, 

he noted that there were broad prospects for cooperation between the two countries in 

space. In March 1995, a deal was signed to transfer manned spacecraft technology to 

China, including cosmonaut training, Soyuz spacecraft capsules, life support systems, 

docking systems, and space suits. In 1996 two Chinese astronauts, Wu Jie and Li 

Qinglong, began training at the Yuri Gagarin Cosmonaut Training Center in Russia. After 

training, these men returned to China. It is believed that they have had a hand in the 

selection, and possibly the training, of the current class of 12 Chinese astronauts. 

The Chinese Shenzhou, however, is not simply a copy of the Russian Soyuz. 

Superficially, the two are similar, both comprised of three separate modules: an orbital 

module, containing experiments or other payloads; a descent module, which the crew 

rides into orbit and back to Earth (it is the only part of the system that returns to Earth); 

and a service module, containing the propulsion systems (which detaches prior to final 

reentry of the descent module and burns up). 

Upon closer examination, however, the Shenzhou is clearly different from the Soyuz. To 

begin with, the Shenzhou is physically larger than a Soyuz capsule. The Shenzhou is 

wider, longer, and about half a ton heavier.36 Furthermore, the Shenzhou has two sets of 

solar panel arrays, compared with the single set of arrays on the Soyuz. The two arrays 

together generate approximately 1.2 kilowatts, which is reportedly comparable to that of 

the entire Mir station, or three times that of an individual Soyuz vessel. 37 This gives the 

craft more power to run various systems and could give it longer endurance. 

One of those solar arrays is on the Shenzhou's orbital modules, which also has its own set 

of engines. This allows the Shenzhou's orbital module to maneuver and sustain itself on 

its own, unlike the orbital module on the Soyuz. This ability was demonstrated in the 

Shenzhou-IV test-flight when the orbital module was boosted to a higher orbit after 

separating from the descent module and was left in orbit for 9 months on its own. The 

combination of its own power and propulsion could make the orbital module a potential 

building block for a Chinese space laboratory. 

China has launched six Shenzhou flights as of 2007. Shenzhou-V, launched in October 

2003, made China only the third nation to orbit its own astronaut (Yang Liwei). 

Shenzhou-VI had a two-man crew, Fei Junlong and Nie Haisheng. All three Chinese 

astronauts are believed to have been fighter pilots in the PLA Air Force. 

Lunar Missions 
The PRC has also indicated that it plans to undertake lunar missions. The Chang'e 

program was intended to involve a lunar orbiter mission in 2007 followed by a lunar 

lander in 2008–2009. The Chang'e program is also expected to involve one or more lunar 

sample retrieval missions, probably by 2017. All of these missions will be unmanned, 

robotic missions. 

Military Space Programs 

The Chinese antisatellite (ASAT) test of January 11, 2007, served as a reminder that the 

People's Liberation Army plays a significant if little discussed role in China's space 

efforts. The PRC has been extremely reticent about its military space programs. This is 

complicated by the dual-use nature of most Chinese satellites, and the avowed interest in 

using space to improve "comprehensive national power," with its civilian and military 

components. 

Given the confluence of military and civilian bureaucracies, the PLA almost certainly has 

access to data gathered from civilian space assets. For example, navigation satellites 

provide the ability to improve navigation and guidance for military and civilian aircraft. 

Similarly, it is likely that the PLA also has access to meteorological and Earth resources 

data derived from satellite information. 

Little is publicly available, however, regarding China's dedicated military space systems. 

In the 1970s, the short-lived Technology Experiment Satellite was reputed to have been 

military in nature. According to some reports, China's initial group of FSW-series 

satellites launched in the 1970s and early 1980s carried Earth imaging payloads that may 

have been intended for the PLA.38 Subsequent FSW satellites may also have conducted 

military missions. 

More recently, reports beginning in 1999 indicated that the PRC was preparing to orbit a 

military communications satellite. The Zhongxing-22 or Fenghuo-1 was eventually 

launched in January 2000.39 That same year, the Chinese orbited a Ziyuan-2 Earth 

observation satellite. Some reports have indicated that it was actually a military imaging 

satellite distinct from the Ziyuan-1 named the Jianbing-3.40

The Chinese manned program also seems to involve a military component. China's 

astronaut corps, for example, is apparently drawn from the ranks of PLA Air Force 

fighter pilots. Some reports have also suggested that the orbital module on the ShenzhouV mission had a military reconnaissance payload, possibly involving either electronic or 

photoreconnaissance. 

Chinese Views on Spacepower 

The PRC defines its national interest in terms of expanding its comprehensive national 

power: "In the period of our socialist modernization construction, national interest and 

the general line and principles of the Party focus on increasing social productive forces, 

revitalizing economy and strengthening comprehensive national power."41 By 
comprehensive national power, the Chinese are referring to the various capabilities 

required to provide for the survival and development of the nation, to meet material and 

ideological demands of its population, and to exert influence on the international scene. 

The China Institute of Contemporary International Relations, a top Chinese think tank, 

has defined comprehensive national power as the "total of the powers or strengths of a 

country in economics, military affairs, science and technology, education, resources, and 

influence."42

Space plays a key role in the development of China's comprehensive national power, 

because it touches on so many of the component elements. As Zhang Qingwei, general 

manager of the China Aerospace Science and Technology Corporation, has noted, 

China's space efforts are comprehensively integrated into "the economy, into social 

development, into scientific advances, and into related industrial areas. It has already 

become a strategic industry in terms of broadly raising China's real comprehensive 

power."43

Economics 

Chinese leadership has consistently supported the development of scientific and technical 

capabilities as part of their effort to improve the national economy. The general view 

seems to be that improvements in science and technology will lead to improvements in 

various Chinese industries, which will in turn raise the overall efficiency and productivity 

of the Chinese economy. State Councillor Chen Zhili, for example, notes in an article in 

the influential journal Qiushi that development of science and technology, and especially 

"independent innovative strength," is important in order to "realize a sustainable and 

healthy economic development."

44

Hu Jintao, in remarks at the unveiling of China's Mid- and Long-Term National Science 

and Technology Development Plan in January 1996, emphasized that science and 

technology represents the first line of production. Consequently, pushing development of

S&T is essential for fostering "autonomous innovation" in China.45 He is echoed by 

Chen, who notes that science and technology "innovation is rapidly becoming the key 

force in propelling a country's development."46 That same phrase is prominently 

mentioned as a principle underlying the development of China's space program.47

More concretely, China's space industry is seen as a major part of the economy. The 

various corporations under CNSA, for example, employ hundreds of thousands of skilled 

workers. A prosperous Chinese space industrial base is therefore one that would absorb 

thousands of engineers. It would also help foster demand for a variety of advanced 

materials and supporting high technology. Satellite and launcher construction requires 

advanced electronics, advanced materials such as composites, and improved energy 

sources. An expanding Chinese space industrial base would therefore promote these other 

key industries as well.48

Along these lines, it is interesting to note that a "Proposal for Development of Our 

Nation's Lunar Exploration Technology" was incorporated in 1997 into Plan 863. The 
plan called for a series of unmanned lunar landings. The aim of the plan was to foster 

China's robotics industry. The plan was reportedly drafted in part by Yang Jiachi, Wang 

Daheng, and Chen Fangyun, three of the scientists who had approached Deng Xiaoping 

about creating Plan 863 in the first place.49

More broadly, Chinese efforts to develop aerospace technology are seen as an enabler, 

pushing the development of other essential foundations of the Chinese economy. Work 

on sophisticated space systems, for example, has the potential to foster improvements in 

systems integration. 50 This is a significant weakness in Chinese industrial and 

technological capabilities, and improvements in this area would probably benefit the 

Chinese economy as a whole as it propagated across industrial sectors. 

The development of China's space applications industry in both depth and breadth would 

also benefit the Chinese economy as a whole. This is one of the major development 

policies enumerated in the 2006 Chinese space white paper, which called to promote 

"space application and accelerate the industrialization of space activities."51

Indeed, space applications are already generating revenue valued in the billions of 

renminbi (RMB) and are seen as a major future growth area. China, for example, is 

already a major user of satellite navigation services. Since 1998, China's market for 

satellite navigation systems has grown at the rate of 50 percent per year. In 2000, the 

market was in the area of RMB2 billion/US$256.4 million, with some 150,000 satellite 

navigation equipment sets sold. By 2003, the market had nearly doubled, to RMB3.95 

billion/$506.4 million, of which half involved commercial services, software 

development, systems integration, and so forth. By 2005, the Chinese satellite navigation 

market was estimated at RMB12 billion/$1.538 billion. 52

Another major area of space applications is satellite broadcasting. There are some 50 

Chinese television programs currently broadcast by satellite, mostly apparently from the 

Central China Television system, but there are efforts to expand this by making 

provincial television programs available to all of China through satellite broadcast as 

well.53 Meanwhile, some Chinese analyses foresee major growth in demand for directbroadcast satellite television. One analysis notes that such growth would help China to 

develop better software, expand China's domestic consumer electronics market, and 

promote the construction of satellites, rockets, and associated equipment. 54

As with space industry, space applications are expected to facilitate growth in national 

comprehensive power, due not only to the direct benefits, but also from indirect effects. 

Satellite communications is seen as integral to expanding Chinese commerce, including 

financial transactions.55 PRC participation in the global economy, therefore, requires 

steady improvements in China's communications capacity, including the satellite 

component. Similarly, improved weather and remote-sensing satellites will likely 

generate improved agricultural yields and better forestry management. Navigation and 

positioning satellites help in urban planning and designing transportation networks. Earth 

imaging satellites provide for more efficient resource and land-use surveys and help warn 
of natural disasters (such as forest and grasslands fires). As China is still a lesser 

developed country, the more efficient use of available resources is essential. 

Nor is this solely a matter of physical resources. Chinese analyses of future satellite 

applications often mention the role of distance learning and telemedicine.56 While this 

would obviously lead to benefits for more isolated areas (by potentially improving the 

standards of teaching and medicine), it also leads to a potentially more efficient allocation 

of resources. The utilization of satellite communications technology to allow expert 

personnel, in essence, to be in multiple places at once means that scarce, trained human 

capital can be employed to the maximum extent. Given the ever-growing demand in 

China for trained personnel, distance learning and telemedicine are powerful means of 

leveraging scarce human resources. 

In this regard, space is also seen as a means of inspiring younger Chinese into a career in 

the sciences. Creating a cadre of scientific and technical personnel is a key part of the 

Mid- and Long-Term Plan. Hu Jintao himself has called for seeking out talent and 

providing international levels of S&T education in order to build a foundation for future 

economic and technological development. 57 Nurturing human talent is also one of the 

key points emphasized by CASC director Jun Jiajun, who notes that there must be careful 

fostering of innovative talent within the space industrial sector.58

Finally, by participating in the international space market, China also stands to gain 

economically. China's entry into the commercial space launch business not only provided 

orders for Chinese launchers, and therefore jobs, but also constituted a welcome source of 

hard currency, in the early stages of reform and opening up. Even more lucrative would 

be the sale of satellites and space services, including navigation and positioning. The 

Nigeriasat program, for example, is valued at $250 million, including satellite 

construction, launch, and insurance.59 The joint effort with Venezuela on the Simon 

Bolivar satellite is believed to be similarly priced. 60

Politics 

Just as space influences the economic aspects of comprehensive national power, it also 

affects the political component, including both domestic and foreign elements. 

Domestic politics . Politically, space has long been seen as a source of Chinese national 

pride. The Chinese developed most of their space program solely through their own 

efforts. This self-reliance, encapsulated in references to the "two bombs, one satellite" 

efforts of the 1960s, underscored that China's achievements were its own. This mantra is 

still regularly cited in current Chinese politics. In 1999, for example, there was an awards 

ceremony for those involved in China's nuclear weapons, missile, and space efforts. 

Recipients were awarded a "two bombs, one satellite" medal. At the ceremony, Jiang 

Zemin spoke of the "two bombs, one satellite" spirit. This spirit, he said, embodies five 

principles, which he characterized as following the leadership of the Chinese Communist 

Party, maintaining a spirit of self-reliance, focusing efforts on particular goals, respecting 
the role of science and technology, and maintaining a spirit of scientific management.61

Jiang called for a continuation of this spirit in ongoing endeavors. 

Other Chinese leaders also continue to refer to the "two bombs, one satellite" spirit, 

specifically linking it with the idea that sophisticated technology was developed from 

minimal resources, by dint of the Party's leadership. 62 The occasion of the Shenzhou-VI 

mission, for example, was credited to "the inheritance and elevation of the spirit of 'two 

bombs, one satellite,' the extension and expansion of the great national spirit, and the 

powerful spiritual motive force for winning complete success."63

Chinese emphasis on autonomous or independent innovation in the space sector would 

seem to represent an extension of a longstanding theme. Thus, in remarks 

commemorating the 50th anniversary of the founding of the Fifth Academy, Jun Jiajun 

noted that China's aerospace industry, and especially CASC, has consistently held to the 

path of autonomous innovation.64 This adherence, in turn, is credited with helping make 

China a more advanced nation. The implication would seem to be that China's rise in 

stature, marked in part by its improved space capabilities, is not only a reflection of 

Chinese achievements, but also is emblematic of the correctness of the Chinese 

Communist Party's decisions and policies. 

At a more immediate level, space systems literally help bind the nation together. For 

example, communications satellites are a key part of China's telecommunications 

network. One of the objectives has been to utilize satellite communications to improve 

village-to-village links. Now there is a growing effort to progress to the next step and 

allow person-to-person links.65 This is especially important in China, where telephone 

penetration, while steadily increasing, is by no means universal. Statistics released in 

2005 by the Ministry of Information Industry, for example, indicated that fixed-line 

telephone penetration in China is approximately 24.9 percent, while cell phone 

penetration is 25.9 percent (although such figures represented 329.5 million and 353.7 

million people, respectively). 66

International politics. From its earliest days, Chinese leadership has seen aerospace 

technology and developments as a source of prestige and international respect. In 1962, 

for example, Foreign Minister Chen Yi told Marshal Nie Rongzhen and Chief of the 

General Staff Luo Ruiqing that "producing atomic bombs, missiles, and supersonic 

aircraft would put me, the Minister of Foreign Relations, in a better position!"67 Mao 

Zedong also noted the importance of such systems in ensuring that China would not be 

bullied. 68

This recognition of the importance of international prestige has often been explicit. As 

China was only the fifth nation to orbit a satellite, Mao himself instructed that said 

satellite should be larger and more capable than the first American satellite. Similarly, 

China is only the third nation to orbit an astronaut on its own, but it made sure that its 

first manned mission was longer than that of either the Soviet Union or the United States. 

In the case of Shenzhou-VI, the mission was seen as not only showcasing Chinese 
technological innovation, but also as a means of potentially burnishing the Chinese brand 

name.69

This effort to utilize space to raise China's reputation has extended to its endeavors to 

engage in international space programs. With the launch of its first Fengyun weather 

satellite, for example, China offered to provide the resulting data to other nations. Indeed, 

Chinese descriptions of the Fengyun series of satellites usually mention that the FY–1C 

was incorporated into the World Meteorological Organization's constellation of weather 

satellites. Similarly, Chinese analyses of the state of their space industry generally 

mention space cooperation efforts with Russia, the European Space Agency, and France. 

The implicit message is that China's space capabilities make it an equal with other, more 

advanced nations. 

While it has sought to leverage more prestige from its space efforts, however, China has 

also sought to utilize its space capabilities to foster additional diplomatic gains. Beijing 

was a major impetus behind the creation of the Asia-Pacific Space Cooperation 

Organization. Beginning in 1992, Thailand, Pakistan, and the PRC sought to form a 

multinational organization among Asian and Pacific states to facilitate cooperation in the 

development of space technology and space applications. In 2006, those three states, 

along with Bangladesh, Indonesia, Iran, Mongolia, and Peru, agreed to form the AsiaPacific Space Cooperation Organization. They also agreed make the PRC its hosting 

country and Beijing its headquarters. 70 Soon afterward, Turkey became the ninth member 

of the organization. 

The creation of such an organization marks one step toward diffusing some of the 

perception in Southeast Asia of a "China threat." It also helps China to forge additional 

links to states with which it generally seeks to maintain good relations (such as Indonesia 

and Mongolia). Similar benefits may accrue from other Chinese cooperative efforts, such 

as those with Brazil. 

There have also been more practical gains. China's first overseas facilities, for example, 

were established as part of the manned space effort. In order to provide constant 

telemetry and tracking capability, China needed land-based facilities abroad in addition to 

its domestic sites and four space-observation vessels. As a result, the PRC established 

facilities in Namibia and Kiribati as support centers for the Shenzhou program. These 

have since been supplemented by facilities in Pakistan (a longtime Chinese ally) and 

Kenya, while the Kiribati facility was dismantled. 

Diplomacy and economics also interact. While China undoubtedly is interested in the sale 

of satellites abroad in order to access the global satellite market, the sale of such systems 

to major oil exporters such as Nigeria and Venezuela may be more than coincidence. 

Similarly, the desire of the Chinese to cooperate with Europe on space technology almost 

certainly is affected by the ongoing embargoes on high-technology exports imposed after 

the events at Tiananmen Square in 1989. 
Taiwan. The unique circumstances of cross-Strait relations between China and Taiwan 

are also affected by China's space program. 

On the one hand, the Chinese have sought to use achievements in space to tie Taiwan 

back to China. Prior to the launch of Shenzhou-V, Chinese officials offered to take seeds 

from Taiwan into space. The offer was made "to reinforce cooperation with Taiwan on 

agricultural sciences in a bid to promote the common development of agricultural 

technology on both sides of the Taiwan Strait." 71 The offer was ultimately accepted, and 

Shenzhou-V carried flower and vegetable seeds from Taiwan into orbit. Xie Mingbao, 

director of the China Manned Space Engineering Office, observed that "we are willing to 

actively promote anything that will benefit Taiwan compatriots."72

Similarly, news regarding China's space efforts is often conveyed in a manner to suggest 

that it reflects upon all Chinese, including those on Taiwan. Fei Junlong, one of the two 

astronauts on the Shenzhou-VI mission, is quoted as saying, "We're grateful for the deep 

love and concern by all Chinese people, the Hong Kong, Macao, and Taiwan 

compatriots," prior to the launch.73

At the same time, however, Beijing-Taipei tensions have also been reflected in space 

affairs. The Chinese facility on Kiribati was closed and the equipment dismantled when 

the Kiribati government decided to recognize Taiwan. Beijing clearly felt that its efforts 

to isolate Taiwan outweighed the benefits of any information from that site. 

Indeed, there is an implicit message from Beijing to Taiwan that China's space 

capabilities are intertwined with its military capabilities. Better space-based sensors 

provide Beijing with the ability to monitor developments on Taiwan. Improved reliability 

in Chinese space launch vehicles will almost certainly be mirrored by similar 

improvements in Chinese tactical and strategic missiles. Improvements in optics and 

controls are likely to lead to not only better space systems, but more lethal and precise 

weaponry as well. 

Military 

This message, of course, is not aimed solely at Taiwan. Space is ultimately a dual-use 

environment. Much of the technology used in space has both military and civilian 

applications. Therefore, building up China's space capabilities inevitably also will have 

an impact on China's military capabilities, as it affects the other components of 

comprehensive national power. 

Chinese analyses of recent wars, especially U.S. military operations since the 1991 Gulf 

War, initially concluded that the key to future warfare was high technology. As Jiang 

Zemin's 1995 speech on the "Two Transformations" noted, the PLA needed to shift from 

emphasizing quantity to emphasizing quality, and from preparing to fight local wars 

under ordinary conditions (industrial age warfare) to preparing to fight local wars under 

modern, high-tech conditions (in light of information technology and systems of 

systems).74
In the subsequent years, however, and further local wars (such as Afghanistan and Iraq), 

it became clear to Chinese analysts that the key technologies were those associated with 

information. The emphasis therefore shifted from local wars under high-tech conditions 

to local wars under informationalized conditions (LWUIC). This, in turn, has made space 

a crucial arena for future military operations. According to these analyses: 

• Future military operations will be joint in nature. Initially, this simply meant 

coordinated efforts among operational level service groupings (such as military 

region air forces or group armies), but increasingly it is assessed as involving 

integrated operations among more tactical level groupings. 

• In order to accomplish joint operations, especially integrated joint operations, 

there must be the ability to gather, share, and apply information. Indeed, 

informationalized warfare is seen as the hallmark of the current age, just as 

mechanized warfare is seen as the hallmark of the industrial age. The objective, 

then, is to achieve information dominance, which is perceived as the prerequisite 

for the ability to successfully undertake LWUIC. 

• Undertaking informationalized operations necessarily involves the ability to 

exploit space. According to some Chinese assessments, space dominance is an 

essential component of information dominance. 

This last conclusion is due in large part to the heavy reliance on space systems exhibited 

by the United States in recent wars. One Chinese article in 2005 noted that: 

• in the Gulf War, the United States used 52 military satellites 

• in Kosovo, the United States and NATO used 86 satellites 

• in the Iraq war, U.S.-UK forces used over 100 satellites.75

For the 2003 Iraq war, another Chinese article estimates that the United States relied on 

satellites for 95 percent of reconnaissance and surveillance information, 90 percent of 

military communications, 100 percent of navigation and positioning, and 10 percent of 

meteorological and weather forecasting. It also estimates the Russian military relies on 

satellites for 70 percent of strategic intelligence and 80 percent of military 

communications.76

It is this steadily escalating reliance upon space for information operations that has led 

the PLA to conclude that dominance of the information domain is predicated on the 

ability to control space. In the opinions of some PLA analysts, without control of space, 

any attempt at dominating the information domain, or exercising combat in the 

electromagnetic spectrum, is made much more difficult, if not outright impossible.77

Others write that "in modern wars, seizing space dominance has already become a vital 

part of seizing information dominance, from which one can then retain the active position 

in the war." 78
Space, in Chinese writings, represents the new strategic high ground and is described as 

such. Chinese authors note that the combination of modern information technology and 

military space systems has created the means of coordinating land, sea, and air forces; 

control of space (and the advantages thus gained in the information domain) in this view 

is now crucial for coordinating joint operations. 79 They write that whoever gains space 

dominance will be able to influence and control other battlefields and will be likely to 

retain the initiative, while loss of that control is likely to lead to a reactive, passive stance. 80 Space is therefore considered an essential part of joint campaigns, a fundamental 

method of fighting future wars; conversely, joint campaign coordination will rely upon 

the ability to exploit space. 81

To this end, PLA analyses discuss space-related tasks. These include: 

• facilitating the transmission of information globally and providing both secure 

and reliable information channels 

• providing essential information regarding weather, which affects military 

operations 

• collecting information regarding an opponent around the clock and providing 

commanders with the early warning necessary to respond to enemy activities 

• undertaking Earth observation, which supports geodesy and general geographic 

information collection 

• providing navigation and positioning information in order to facilitate friendly 

troop movements with greater certainty as to their own location, as well as 

provide guidance for modern weapons.82

It is probably no accident that each of these mission areas is currently supported by at 

least part of the Chinese inventory of space assets. The dual-use nature of China's space 

systems has not prevented it from developing the systems it believes are necessary to 

sustain military operations. 

At the same time, PLA authors have also discussed the importance of denying space to an 

opponent. Unlike air or naval dominance, space dominance is focused on providing 

windows of opportunity, establishing control only over certain areas of space for a certain 

period of time. 83

It was unclear as of 2007 whether a PLA space doctrine had been formally promulgated. 

But recent PRC activities suggest that interest is shifting from the theoretical to the 

physical. Reports in late 2006, for example, indicated that the PRC has fired lasers, 

possibly several times, at U.S. satellites, apparently in an attempt to blind them.84 This 

was then followed by the January 2007 test of a direct-ascent ASAT that destroyed a 

defunct FY–1C weather satellite. 

Although the kinetic kill vehicle test focused attention on Chinese development of hardkill systems, PLA writings appear to approach the topic from a much broader perspective. 

Since the objective is attaining information dominance—that is, dominating space is a 
means, not necessarily an end—the focus is on disrupting the flow of information, rather 

than necessarily destroying satellites per se. 

Consequently, many PLA writings discuss the utility of soft-kill methods against space 

architectures. Satellite operations rely heavily on the use of computers to transmit and 

manage the data.85 Without functioning command, control, communications, computers, 

and information systems, it would be difficult to employ space systems. This is a major 

reason why space combat and information combat are so closely linked.86 As one set of 

PLA teaching materials notes, an especially effective means to soft-kill space systems 

may be interference with the computer systems controlling space platforms, both onboard systems as well as those in ground-based control centers.87

PLA writings also suggest that there is an important role for passive countering of space 

systems, which involves various deception and camouflage methods to counter enemy 

space-based reconnaissance and surveillance systems.88 Utilizing various deception 

measures and stealthing techniques in order to forestall detection from space offers the 

potential for China to suddenly appear where there had been few indications of a PLA 

presence, thus surprising an opponent. Thus, PLA authors have suggested that "skillful 

use of technical means to avoid reconnaissance" can be an extremely effective combat 

style in space-related coordinated activities. 89

Regardless of whether through soft or hard kill, the key objective seems to be denying 

opponents access to information by interfering with their space-based systems and 

thereby retarding their command and control. In short, by denying an opponent the ability 

to use space freely, the PLA would be denying them the ability to achieve information 

dominance and therefore make them less able to fight an informationalized war. 

Prospects for the Future 

Given that China sees improved space capabilities as contributing to the growth of its 

comprehensive national power, it is hardly surprising that it is interested in strengthening 

its space capabilities. China's aerospace efforts are likely to focus on undertaking "three 

transformations." These include: 

• shifting from developing civilian goods by the aerospace industry to developing a 

civilian aerospace industry 

• shifting from broad, uncoordinated development of space systems toward a more 

coordinated, focused development effort 

• shifting from management methods inherited from the planned economy toward 

methods more suited to a market economy. 90

The overall theme underlying these shifts is that the PRC wishes to make its spacepower 

more responsive to the needs of the nation and the development of national 

comprehensive power. This will require a more responsive industrial system, optimized 

toward considering likely markets and client demands. It will also entail a more focused 

approach toward research and development. 
The 2006 white paper on Chinese space activities enumerates areas in which these 

transformations will be realized. Certainly, there will be new hardware, including new 

launchers using more environmentally friendly propellants, as well as a range of new 

satellite systems, such as improved remote sensing, telecommunications, and navigation 

satellites. This will require improvements in subsystems, including power sources and 

materials. In addition, however, the white paper notes that China will develop ground 

equipment production and operational services, in order to extend itself into the 

"secondary development of space technology."91

Also prominent is the expansion of China's space industry beyond hardware into space 

applications and space services. This includes improvements in its space applications 

system, so that the information it does obtain can be better exploited. It also entails the 

promotion of scientific management and the fostering of talent.92

One likely focus will be China's space-based communications systems, including direct 

broadcast satellite television. This is perceived as an important means of pushing greater 

domestic political and ideological unity and providing additional cultural development. 93

It is also seen as driving the development of China's software industry, as well as 

promoting the construction of satellites, rockets, and other associated items. 94

Another probable focus of development efforts will be satellite navigation and 

positioning. Satellite navigation will likely be an integral element of the 

informationalization of China's economy and society. Chinese analyses discuss the 

merging of wireless communications systems, computer systems, and geographic 

information systems to create individual mobile, multiuse information service terminals. 

95 Not only, then, is the PRC likely to develop its own satellite navigation system (as 

called for in the space white paper), but also it is likely to try and expand its presence in 

satellite navigation applications, such as product tracking. 

Such efforts will take some time, however, as China's space industries, despite 50 years 

of development, are still relatively small players. One Chinese analysis, for example, 

observed that the average working capital for Chinese aerospace firms in 2005 was only 

about RMB10 million/US$1.3 million, and only 3 percent of Chinese companies have 

operating capital above RMB20 million/US$2.6 million.96 By comparison, Boeing 

Corporation's space-related revenue alone amounted to US$9.1 billion. 97

In the military arena, there probably will be sustained, if not heightened, attention to 

space operations. PLA authors have increasingly focused on the importance of joint 

operations, and therefore on the need for information dominance in future local wars 

under informationalized conditions. This is likely to include additional dedicated military 

space support systems; it also may result in further testing of offensive and defensive 

space systems. Just as important, it could include efforts to improve the PLA's ability to 

interfere with an opponent's overall space architecture while undertaking defensive 

countermeasures to defend its own. 

Conclusion 
At the end of the Gulf War, Pierre Joxe, French minister of defense, concluded that the 

conflict had shown that "the stakes in space go beyond the strict definition of defense. 

They are national. Not to possess this capacity would affect the very status of the nation." 

98 In short, a state seeking to be a major power must be a space power. 

The growth of the PRC over the past several decades suggests that China is well on track 

to becoming a major power. It has seen constant economic growth, greater political 

standing, and increased influence in world politics. At the same time, however, the PRC 

is a nation in transition. While parts are rapidly industrializing and developing, the nation 

as a whole remains relatively poor. There is an omnipresent potential for domestic unrest 

(often actualized) exacerbated by uneven growth, political corruption, and problematic 

demographics. 

To remedy this situation, the Chinese authorities are intent upon finding and developing 

those technologies and industries that it can best leverage to maximize national benefits, 

and increase its comprehensive national power. China's space program would seem to be 

one of those areas. For the PRC, the development of spacepower may be necessary not 

only to underscore its great power status, but also to help it attain and retain that status at 

all. 

Notes

1. James L. Hyatt III et al., Space Power 2010, Research Report no. 95–05 (Maxwell Air Force Base, 

AL: Air Command and Staff College, May 1995), 5. 

2. Dana J. Johnson, Scott Pace, and C. Bryan Gabbard, Space: Emerging Options for National Power

(Santa Monica, CA: RAND, 1998), 8. 

3. Joint Publication 3–14, Joint Doctrine for Space Operations (Washington, DC: Joint Staff, August 

2002), GL–6. 

4. People's Republic of China State Council, China's Space Activities in 2006, "Aims and Principles 

of Development" (Beijing: State Council Information Office, 2006). 

5. Deng Liqun, ed., China Today: Defense Science and Technology, vol. I (Beijing: National 

Defence Industry Press, 1993), 28. 

6. Ibid., 32; Chen Yanping, "China's Space Activities, Policy and Organization, 1956–1986," 

unpublished dissertation, 72. 

7. Evan Feigenbaum, China's Techno-Warriors (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2003), 21. 

8. John Lewis and Xue Litai, China Builds the Bomb (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1988), 

211. 

9. Deng Liqun, 356. 

10. Li Dayao, "A Survey of the Development of Space Technology in China," Zhongguo Hangtian

(June 1999), 16–19, in FBIS-CHI (September 21, 1999). 

11. Chen Yanping, 197; Deng Liqun, 96. 

12. Deng Liqun, 97. 

13. Wang Daheng was an optics specialist responsible for rocket and satellite tracking system design, 

and he designed the first Chinese ground-imaging cameras. 

14. Chen Fangyun, radio electronics expert, was responsible for satellite control systems. 

15. Yang Jiachi, high-altitude atmospheric physicist, Executive Committee Vice President of the 

Chinese Society of Astronautics (1983), was responsible for automation in Chinese satellites. 
16. Nuclear physicist Wang Ganchang was one of the principals in the Chinese atomic bomb program 

and also an expert in laser-based fusion. 

17. Material drawn from Guojia Gao Jishu Yanjiu Fazhan Jihua 863, in FBIS-CHI (July 21, 2000). 

For further discussion of the creation of Plan 863, see Feigenbaum, 141–143. 

18. For more on COSTIND, see Harlan Jencks, "COSTIND Is Dead! Long Live COSTIND! 

Restructuring China's Defense, Scientific, Technical, and Industrial Sector," in The People's 

Liberation Army in the Information Age, CF–145–CAPP/AF, ed. James Mulvenon and Richard 

Yang (Santa Monica, CA: RAND Corporation, 1999). 

19. This is one reason the head of the GAD is often named as the head of major programs such as the 

manned space effort. Peng Hai-lei, "Shenzhou V Spacecraft Will Leave the Factory As Planned; 

Li Jinai is Appointed as Commander-in-chief of China's Manned Space Project," Wen Wei Po

(July 25, 2003), in FBIS CPP20030725000088.

20. This new entity is sometimes referred to in English as State COSTIND (SCOSTIND), to reduce 

confusion with the old COSTIND. 

21. China Great Wall Industry Corporation, "About CGWIC," available at 

<www.cgwic.com/about/milestones.htm>. 

22. Gao Ruofei, ""Development of China's International Commercial Launch Service," Zhongguo 

Hangtian no. 9, 2006, 13–20. 

23. Luciano Anselmo, "Orbital Analysis of the Shenzhou-6 Manned Mission in Support of the 

Malindi Tracking Station, Tracking Report" (Pisa, Italy: Space Flight Dynamics Laboratory, 

2006). 

24. Brian Harvey, China's Space Program (Chicester, UK: Praxis Publishing, 2004), 107–108. 

25. Peter deSelding, "China's Satellite Industry Enters World Stage," Space News, July 5, 2005. 

26. Zong He, "An Introduction to China's Satellite Systems," Zhongguo Hangtian no. 10, 2006, 9. 

27. Liu Cheng, "The Application of FY–1C Polar Orbiting Meteorological Satellite in Natural 

Disaster and Environment Monitoring," Shanghai Hangtian, June 2000, 54. 

28. "Achievements and Future of China's Satellite Programs," Zhongguo Hangtian no. 2, 2001, 11–16. 

29. "GEO-News Around the World," available at 

<http://goes.gsfc.nasa.gov/text/geonews.html#FENGYUN>. 

30. Zong He, 10. 

31. Harvey, 143–148. 

32. Zong He, 8. 

33. Chen Yiyuan, "Successful Launch of CBERS–1 Shows China's Space Navigation Technology Has 

Reached New Heights," Zhongguo Hangtian, March 1, 2000, 21–28, in FBIS-CHI. 

34. Fan Shiming, "Discussion about the Way of Satellite Remote Sensing Industrialization," 

Zhongguo Hangtian no. 2, 2006, 20. 

35. Bei Chao, Yang Jiawei, and Zhang Wei, "Nanosatellite Distributor Design Proposal," Zhongguo 

Hangtian Bao, August 23, 2002, 4, in FBIS-CHI. 

36. Ben Iannotta, "China's Divine Craft," Aerospace America (April 2001). 

37. Ibid. 

38. Harvey, 86–87, 153. 

39. Shirley Kan, "China: Possible Missile Technology Transfers from US Satellite Export Policy—

Actions and Chronology," CRS Report 98–485F (Washington, DC: Congressional Research 

Service, March 27, 2003), 41. 

40. Ibid. 

41. Peng Guangqian, Yao Youzhi, eds., The Science of Military Strategy (Beijing: Military Science 

Publishing House, 2005), 167. 

42. China Institute of Contemporary International Relations, Global Strategic Pattern—International 

Environment of China in the New Century (Beijing: Shishi Press, 2000), cited in Hu Angang and 

Men Honghua, "The Rising of Modern China Comprehensive National Power and Grand 

Strategy." 

43. Zhang Qingwei, "China's Aerospace Industry R&D—Strategy, Policy, and Sino-European 

Cooperation," Zhongguo Hangtian no. 6, 2005, 3. 

44. Chen Zhili, "Earnestly Implement Nation's 'Outline for Mid-to Long-Term Scientific and 

Technological Development'; Striving to Construct an Innovative Country," Qiushi, September 16, 

2006, in FBIS-CHI CPP 20061025701009. 
45. "National Science and Technology Conference Opens at Jinglong," Jiefangjun Bao, January 10, 

2006. 

46. Chen Zhili. 

47. PRC State Council, "Aims and Principles of Development," in China's Space Activities in 2006

(Beijing: State Council Information Office, 2006). 

48. Ma Xingrui, "China's Aerospace Technology Promotes Development of Other Industries," 

Zhongguo Hangtian, no. 8, 2005, 6. 

49. Sibing He, "CNSA Views of the Moon," Lunar Enterprise Daily II, no. 101, May 18, 2002, 

available at <www.spaceagepub.com/cnsa.html>. 

50. Ma Xingrui, "China's Aerospace Technology Promotes Development of Other Industries," 

Zhongguo Hangtian, no. 8, 2005, 6. 

51. PRC State Council, "Development Policies and Measures," in China's Space Activities in 2006

(Beijing: State Council Information Office, 2006). 

52. Lin Busheng and Shi Weiping, "Analysis of China's Aerospace Industry Development," Zhongguo 

Hangtian no. 8, 2006. 

53. Ibid. 

54. Tong Huijie, Ge Bangjun, "Situation and Prospect of China's Satellite Application Industry," 

Zhongguo Hangtian no. 5, 2005, 18. 

55. Ma Xingrui, "China's Aerospace Technology Promotes Development of Other Industries," 

Zhongguo Hangtian no. 8, 2005, 7. 

56. Ibid. 

57. "National Science and Technology Conference Opens at Jinglong," Jiefangjun Bao, January 10, 

2006. 

58. Yuan Jiajun, "Firmly Hold to Autonomous Innovation, Pushing Space Industry's Continuous, 

Leapfrogging Development," Zhongguo Hangtian no. 10, 2006, 5–6. 

59. Peter deSelding, "China's Satellite Industry Enters World Stage," Space News, July 5, 2005. 

60. Telesur, "Simon Bolivar Satellite: A Space Based Link for Latin American Progress and 

Integration," available at < telesurtv.net>, FBIS FEA20061229063026. 

61. Xinhua Domestic Service, September 18, 1999, in FBIS-CHI. 

62. "Defense Industrial Department Carries Forward 'Two Bombs One Satellite' Spirit," Renmin 

Ribao, April 26, 2000. 

63. "A Brand New Leap and Brilliant Achievement," Renmin Ribao, October 18, 2005. 

64. Yuan Jiajun. 

65. Lin Busheng and Shi Weiping. 

66. "353 Mln of 683 Mln Chinese Phone Subscribers Use Cells," Renmin Ribao, May 25, 2005, 

available at <http://english.peopledaily.com.cn/200505/25/eng20050525_186748.html>. 

67. Deng Liqun, ed., 60. 

68. Ibid., 28. 

69. Song Lifang, "2005: Witness the Success of Autonomous Innovation in China's Space Industry," 

Zhongguo Hangtian, no. 1, 2006. 

70. "China to Endorse Asia-Pacific Space Cooperation Organization Convention," Chinanews, June 

27, 2006, available at <http://www.china.org.cn/english/scitech/172866.htm>. 

71. "Taiwan Welcome to Send Seeds Aboard 'Shenzhou V,'" Renmin Ribao, September 18, 2003, 

available at <http://english.peopledaily.com.cn/200309/18/eng20030918_124493.shtml>. 

72. "Crop Seeds from Taiwan Aboard Shenzhou-V," Xinhua News Agency, October 16, 2003, 

available at <http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/2003-10/16/content_1126614.htm>. 

73. "Shenzhou VI Touches Down," China Daily, October 16, 2005, available at 

<http://english.sina.com/technology/p/1/2005/1016/49875.html>. 

74. Zhang Qinsheng and Li Bingyan, "Complete New Historical Transformations—Understanding 

Gained From Studying CMC Strategic Thinking on 'Two Transformations," Jiefangjun Bao, 

January 14, 1997, in FBIS-CHI. One sometimes sees this term written as "the two basic 

transformations" or the "two basic conversions." 

75. Zhang Yuwu et al., "Informationalized Warfare Will Make Seizing the Aerospace Technology 

'High Ground' a Vital Factor," Jiefangjun Bao, March 30, 2005. 

76. Wang Yao and Shi Chunming, "Regarding 'Space Information Warfare,'" Zhongguo Guofang Bao, 

June 12, 2003, available at <http://news.xinhuanet.com/mil/2003-06/12/content_916804.htm>. 
77. Xu Wei, "Space Power and Space Operations," Zhongguo Junshi Kexue no. 1, 2002, 41. 

78. Zhang Xianqi, "Space Strategy and National Security," Zhongguo Junshi Kexue no. 1, 2002, 15. 

79. Gao Yubiao, ed., Joint Campaign Course Materials (Beijing: Academy of Military Science 

Publishing House, August 2001), 33. 

80. Li Daguang, "The Characteristics and Rules of Law of Space Strategy," Zhongguo Junshi Kexue

no. 1, 2002, 33–34. 

81. Wang Houqing and Zhang Xingye, eds., The Science of Campaigns (Beijing: National Defense 

University Publishing House, May 2000), 394. 

82. Wang Yao and Shi Chunming. 

83. Xu Wei, 40. 

84. Vago Muradian, "China Tried to Blind U.S. Satellites with Laser," Defense News, September 22, 

2006, available at <www.defensenews.com/story.php?F=2121111&C=america>. 

85. Gao Yubiao, ed., 120. 

86. Xue Xinglin, ed., Campaign Theory Learning Guide (Beijing: National Defense University 

Publishing House, November 2001), 115. 

87. Zhang Zhiwei and Feng Chuanjiang, "Views on Future Air-Space Operations," Zhongguo Junshi 

Kexue no. 2, 2006, 59. 

88. Gao Yubiao, ed., 120, and Xue Xinglin, ed., 115. 

89. Wang Baocun, "Information Warfare in the Kosovo Conflict," Jiefangjun Bao, May 25, 1999, 6, 

and Zhang Zhiwei and Feng Chuanjiang, 59. 

90. Ma Xingrui, "China's Aerospace Technology Promotes Development of Other Industries," 

Zhongguo Hangtian no. 8, 2005, 8. 

91. PRC State Council, "Development Policies and Measures," in China's Space Activities in 2006. 

92. PRC State Council, "Development Targets and Major Tasks for the Next Five Years" and 

"Development Policies and Measures," in China's Space Activities in 2006. 

93. Ma Xingrui, 6–7. 

94. Tong Huijie and Ge Bangjun, "Situation and Prospect of China's Satellite Application Industry," 

Zhongguo Hangtian no. 5, 2005, 16. 

95. Ibid. 

96. Ibid. 

97. Lon Rains, "Lockheed Martin, Boeing Dominate the Space Industry," Space News, July 31, 2006. 

98. Bob Preston, Plowshares and Power (Washington, DC: National Defense University Press, 1994), 

4. 
Chapter 25:

The European "Spacepower"? A Multifaceted Concept

Xavier Pasco

Is the European Union's (EU's) ambition to manage its own military operations realistic 

unless it develops satellite networks that can operate independently of America's space 

assets? Or should Europeans simply rely on U.S. technology? Can Europeans even expect 

to fight alongside the United States in future wars without increased access to space 

technology? All of these questions are highly relevant to the EU's hesitant efforts to 

develop a common European Security and Defense Policy (ESDP). Military commanders 

and their political leaders are increasingly dependent on space-based technologies for 

coping with many security challenges—ranging from humanitarian disasters to 

warfighting. But European governments have been slow to invest in space-based 

technologies for military purposes. 

Considering the growing importance of space technology for military operations, the 

challenge for Europe is to transform a collection of disparate and relatively modest 

programs into a European military space architecture. The U.S.-pioneered "revolution in 

military affairs" (RMA)—a set of new military technologies based on computers and 

telecommunications—is closely associated with the future development of military space 

programs. In Europe, however, the RMA has been the subject of mistrust; in particular, 

there has been uncertainty about the military relevance of such high-technology–oriented 

thinking. Therefore, Europe has not been prepared to fully support the development of 

major military space programs. 

Today, the United States accounts for perhaps more than 90 percent of the money spent 

on military programs in space.1 European investments in space-based military 

applications amount to less than 5 percent of the global total. The huge disparity between 

American and European investment in space technology will almost certainly increase 

the gap between American and European military capabilities. The very notion of 

spacepower can only reflect these global differences, considering that distinct levels of 

military dependency on these space systems naturally lead to different senses of urgency 

in protecting militarily the satellites in orbit. 

Still, while the United States is already engaged in an unprecedented effort to adapt its 

armed forces to today's security environment using space-based technologies, European 

governments also recognize that they will have to adapt their intelligence and information 

resources to cope with more volatile situations—possibly involving the use of weapons of 

mass destruction—and more elusive enemies such as international terrorist networks. 

Space-based technology is a primary element for developing autonomous intelligence 

tools for Europe. European governments, therefore, should consider what space systems 

are necessary to both fulfill European military requirements and share more of the 
military burden with the United States during coalition warfare. But European 

governments have also agreed to develop their own collective armed forces so as to meet 

their North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) and EU commitments. At the Helsinki 

summit in 1999, the EU agreed to work on the creation of a common European Security 

and Defense Policy. The point of the ESDP is to allow the EU to carry out small-scale 

"crisis management" operations, when NATO is not involved. The EU has therefore 

committed itself to a headline goal (a force of 60,000 troops), plus supporting naval, 

aerial, and civilian capabilities. The EU wants to be able to tackle the so-called 

Petersberg tasks (humanitarian relief, rescue missions, peacekeeping, and peacemaking) 

without having to rely on the United States for transport aircraft, intelligence gathering, 

command and control, and other capabilities. 

More concretely, the political green light given to the creation of common European 

battlegroups has helped define a first format for planning genuine European military 

capabilities. It is acknowledged that these forces, among which responsibilities will be 

distributed following a rotating national leadership, will have to rely on shared 

information capabilities. Their use should be coordinated directly from Brussels by both 

an operational headquarters and a force headquarters. While still under discussion, these 

military structures, which have been accepted in principle, may typically appear as 

primary users of space resources in Europe. While not a revolution in itself, such a 

command chain using satellite systems for information would perfectly fit the level of 

development space has attained in Europe, while keeping, at this stage, far behind the 

United States. Once in service, these structures will mark the first steps in the concrete 

use of space by Europe for common military purposes. 

None of these issues are easy ones. The intrinsic link between space programs and 

information technologies makes space the key to a new, almost uncharted, world in 

warfighting techniques. Pursuing very demanding and costly military space programs 

must not create overdependency on a sector that remains technologically difficult and 

vulnerable. Europe already possesses a few military space programs that can form the 

basis for future developments. But the number of these military programs is limited, and 

their interface with real combat is relatively moderate. European governments, therefore, 

need to make some decisions now about using space-based technology in the conflicts of 

tomorrow. Given static European defense budgets, decisions to develop space technology 

will have to be weighed against other military priorities. More specifically, if European 

countries are to make the most of their space resources, they should also evaluate the 

changing uses of military space systems in the United States. 

New European Operational Needs: From Theory to Practice

For Europe, the path is somewhat narrow between fulfilling common requirements more 

efficiently through commercial ventures and needing to protect its autonomy, should 

military or political circumstances require it. European governments, therefore, need to 

think about a space strategy in terms of a European architecture. This is necessary for 

integrating European national programs, whether civilian or military. The key step is to 

ensure that the different programs can operate together. 
Naturally, national programs have reflected the specificity of the national operational 

requirements. During the Cold War, France justified its production of space-based 

capabilities—albeit on a much more modest scale than the United States and the Soviet 

Union—on the grounds that it needed independent intelligence assets. For the French, 

like their independent nuclear arsenal, access to space and the construction of 

independent launchers—which gave birth to the Ariane family of space launchers—are 

viewed as necessary guarantees of strategic independence. 

It is also true that common military needs may emerge and tend to rationalize a collective 

military and/or security use of space. Satellites are also used as a force multiplier—a 

means of increasing the efficiency and effectiveness of military operations. Information 

coming from space allows commanders in distant headquarters to see on screen, in real 

time, the location of their forces and those of their opponents, and to guide weapons 

precisely to their targets. This means that soldiers need to be equipped with sophisticated 

personal communications devices. But it also requires the transmission of so-called 

value-added information: the ability to mix different forms of information sources, to 

make the information relevant for the user. Strategists bet on compensating for the risk of 

engaging forces in a badly defined environment with better knowledge and by exerting 

military action from some distance. The combination of intelligence information with 

positioning and guidance data gives an inescapable edge to armed forces with access to 

space technology. 

However, the geostrategic landscape is undergoing a total reshaping. Conflicts of diverse 

nature can break out with almost no warning. This new security environment calls for 

increasingly adaptable and flexible responses, including such capabilities as 

peacekeeping operations at the lower end of the combat spectrum. To respond effectively 

requires complete (multisensor) and intelligent information (data processing and 

information technology). The diversity of conflicts and the enormous amount of data 

needed for combat operations require space programs to interoperate increasingly with 

other intelligence and telecommunications means. 

Different pieces of information coming from diverse sensors (space-, air-, sea-, or Earthbased) need to be merged, so that commanders and soldiers have a continuous flow of 

intelligence data. Space systems would provide strategic information. Indeed, among 

diverse capabilities, it is recognized that their permanence and the nonintrusive character 

of their activity reinforce their strategic value. The simple fact that satellites can be used 

before, during, and after a conflict definitely makes them a distinctive asset that can be 

used either for general long-term monitoring or for more focused and time-demanding 

intelligence. Complementary assets such as unmanned aerial vehicles would provide 

tactical information. Such means would then be devoted to the conduct of military 

operations with a better information-gathering capability, but on a smaller scale (theaterwide) and for a more limited period. 

Moreover, the importance of continuous information flows becomes more acute in a 

coalition-led war, when partners have to share data coming from their own systems. This 

requires allies to make their information technology and telecommunications systems 
fully interoperable. If the partner countries overcome the technical challenges, the 

strategic nature of the information provided by space systems should increase mutual 

understanding and trust in a coalition-led war. In addition, military users of space 

technology increasingly rely on the integration of military space applications with 

civilian systems. For example, several civil telecommunications projects, consisting of 

satellites used for mobile or multimedia purposes, fit easily into military 

telecommunications systems. 

In time, space applications may have a more central place in the functioning of the whole 

military organization. The digitization of the battlefield encourages military officers to 

think in terms of communications networks that link the air, naval, and ground forces, 

rather than to focus on traditional platforms such as aircraft, ships, and tanks. This 

concept of network-centric warfare suggests that space applications may be about to enter 

a new era, evolving into the role of a military "nervous system." 

Still, many military commanders, especially in Europe, fear that excessive use of 

integrated information technologies during combat operations would lead to a flattening 

of the chain of command. These concerns do not just reflect the resistance to change 

usually shown by any social organization. The idea that warfighting can become more 

like a video game, with buttons pressed on consoles while the enemy is watched on big 

screens, understandably has made many nervous, leading some to question the usefulness 

of RMA-inspired technology. That has been the case particularly in Europe, where no full 

consensus has been reached about the future missions European military forces would 

have to perform and with awareness of the fact that any military action would be subject 

to political debate first. While debatable from a purely operational perspective, this 

reality makes any possibility to shorten the decisionmaking process seem at least as much 

a flaw as an advantage. New technologies imply major consequences for national military 

doctrines and warfighting techniques. Different assessments of the usage of information 

technologies in modern combat also call for cautious approaches toward any 

telecommunications integration process. 

Existing European Space Capabilities 

The controversy over the alleged presence of weapons of mass destruction in Iraq has 

only reinforced the feeling that a fully autonomous intelligence space system must remain 

at the top of the priority list in Europe.2 Until today, Europe's space resources have relied 

mainly on a collection of national assets. These satellites have developed quite 

dramatically in two main areas: observation and telecommunications. 

In the field of observation, recent history has shown how much a collective system can be 

envisioned considering the complementary approaches under way. The first French 

military observation satellite launched in the mid-1990s, Helios 1–A, was completed by a 

second one, Helios 1–B, launched in December 1999. Another Helios 2 series, run solely 

by France, with a first satellite launched in December 2004, both enlarged the nature of 

collected intelligence (with a supplementary infrared channel) and increased the 

transmission rate and volume, thus increasing the flexibility of the system.3 This effort in 
optical satellites has remained strongly associated with French industrial know-how. On 

the civilian side, France has also decided to launch a successor program to the older Spot 

satellites. This program, called Pleiades, will use a 1-ton platform and will provide 70-

centimeter-class imagery for civilian and military purposes. The extreme agility of the 

satellites increasing the performances of the Pleiades system will possibly complement 

the Helios data. Other national efforts include those in the United Kingdom to develop 

domestic capabilities based on microsatellites4 (with a first experimental TopSat owned 

by the British Ministry of Defence launched in 2005); and in Sweden with the Svea 

project equivalent to Seosat in Spain, both offering a 2.5-meter ground resolution and 

both also raising some military interest. 

Germany, Italy, and the United Kingdom have developed some capabilities in the field of 

radar techniques giving birth to recent programmatic developments. The German military 

SAR (synthetic aperture radar)-Lupe program led to the launch of the first German Earth 

observation satellite on December 19, 2006, with four more satellites in line for launch 

over the next 2 years. In Italy, the program for four SAR satellites, dubbed Cosmo, has 

also taken shape, with satellites launched over the 2007–2010 period. 

While based on specific national orientations and know-how, these systems, having 

reached some kind of a critical mass, will finally be pooled to form the first European 

Earth observation architecture. Some examples, still under definition at this stage given 

the novelty of most of the systems, can be evoked as they have already been the subject 

of intense discussions and have shown relatively heterogeneous evolutions. Examples 

include the following: 

The French Helios 2 and the German SAR-Lupe do not amount to a collective satellite 

system. Defense planners envisage only common use of the French and German systems. 

Data exchange procedures will be organized between the two systems to enrich the 

information gathered by both programs, and these data exchange arrangements are an 

important first step in the development of a collective European military space system. 

The Pleiades-Cosmo project has been formed as a joint venture between France and Italy, 

who concluded a bilateral agreement in January 2001. The aim has been to develop a 

civilian space system for optical and radar imagery that could be used for military 

purposes. The radar segment has already come on line starting in 2007–2008 (the last of 

the four Cosmo satellites is expected to be on orbit in 2010), while the optical satellites 

are to be orbited in 2010. Pleiades-Cosmo may prove to be the real precursor of a 

collectively designed system at the European level and a test bed for the future 

replacement of national programs such as the Helios series. The increasing cost of 

military systems makes the success of such dual-use programs highly desirable. 

In the field of telecommunications, the United Kingdom, France, Italy, and Spain have all 

developed national space capacities, although the scale of these efforts varies. The United 

Kingdom uses its own Skynet system, a constellation of three dedicated satellites with 

worldwide coverage for the British armed forces. In August 1998, the British government 

decided to develop Skynet V, a new generation of military telecommunication satellites. 
Skynet V has been developed under the Private Finance Initiative, whereby the system is 

fully dedicated to the national authorities in times of crisis but the managing organization 

can commercialize the capability for the rest of the time. The Italian SICRAL–1 and the 

Spanish Hispasat complete the European picture, thus providing a credible capability as 

demonstrated by the recent selection of the trinational SICRAL-Skynet-Syracuse III 

architecture to form the future NATO super-high-frequency space telecommunications 

system. 

Theoretically, other areas (such as early warning, electronic intelligence, and space 

surveillance) may be regarded as potential candidates for future military space 

developments in Europe. Nevertheless, approaching more operational issues can only 

raise the difficulty of squeezing out more detailed common operational requirements at 

the strategic and the operative levels, leading to Europe's well-known difficulty in 

creating a consensus for a common defense policy. 

From National to European Programs? 

Thinking about a European military space program raises the issue of how to incorporate 

different national and European systems and integrate decisionmaking procedures. 

Traditionally, Earth observation is the only field with any European military space 

cooperation. This cooperation has been materialized since 1991 through the EU satellite 

center in Torrejon, Spain. Providing satellite imagery interpretation, this center has acted 

since 2001 as a military intelligence provider directly for the European Security and 

Defense Policy. The Torrejon center will benefit from any improvement made in the 

constitution of the European armed forces, adding gradually more military-oriented 

missions besides its more usual security-related activity. In particular, sensitive issues 

such as the sharing of intelligence data coming from existing and future national space 

systems during EU crisis situations involving the newly formed European forces will 

have to be addressed via the Satellite Center channel. 

In addition to this institutional approach, the difficulties that followed for building a 

French-German optical/radar integrated system (called Helios/Horus at the time) have led 

to more detailed discussions about the common use (and even development) of military 

satellites. In this respect, since 1999, the governments of Belgium, France, Germany, 

Greece, Italy, and Spain have been working on an agreement called the Common 

Operational Requirements for Global European Earth Observation System by Satellites—

more commonly known by its French acronym BOC ( Besoin opérationnel commun). 

The aim is to define common requirements for military or dual-use Earth observation 

systems in the visible, infrared, and radar domains. This document is a first step toward 

deeper cooperation, with the objective to make future multinational agreements more 

durable. The BOC approach, by focusing on common requirements, differs radically from 

the purely financial agreements that traditionally were the essence of European space 

cooperation. Furthermore, the creation in 2002 of a European military imagery group 

called the Strategic IMINT (imagery intelligence) Action Group with military 

representatives from Belgium, France, Germany, Spain, and the United Kingdom led 
directly to the constitution of European Capability Action Plan groups that have paved 

the way for common operational thinking with a dedicated space group. The six-nation 

BOC effort is now transforming into a second step called MUSIS (multinational spacebased imaging system for surveillance, reconnaissance, and observation), which is 

intended to specify a cooperative architecture to be running by the middle of the next 

decade. 5

According to figures published in France in October 2001, the total cost of such a 

development scheme (including observation, telecommunications, early warning, 

electronic intelligence, space surveillance, and navigation) would amount to around 800 

million euros annually for 10 to 15 years.6 These figures have been contested by an 

expert group mandated by the European Commission (the so-called Spasec Group Report 

published in March 20057), which more than doubled the estimate. 

Even if no alternative view has been offered, these estimations remain to be confirmed, 

and some other calculations may certainly diverge from these figures. It will be useful in 

any case to carefully assess these projections and to begin to think about the total cost for 

the acquisition and operation of these items. This will be the only way to compare the 

value of investing in space rather than in other areas, helping European decisionmakers to 

measure the global cost of any equipment strategy. On the other hand, the cost of 

maintaining national capabilities will also have to be weighed compared to shared 

solutions involving several European countries. 

A Multifaceted Military and Security Space in Europe: From Dual-use Programs to 

a Long-term Strategy? 

Recent technological trends are making the classical distinction between civilian and 

military technologies more tenuous. Like most information technologies, the constant 

improvement of the cost/performance ratio of electronic chips also drives space 

applications. And progressively more space architectures can mix civilian and military 

space systems. Most modern military thinkers agree that armed forces are increasingly 

dependent on using information flows, whatever their source or nature. 

The space programs needed by the future European military forces will not only have to 

adapt to the military national-European interfaces, as just noted, but they will also have to 

make increasing use of the dual technologies and systems. As can be judged from recent 

decisions or declarations, this latest evolution may force profound changes in national 

military thinking. 

Two main programs currently on the European agenda—Galileo, the European 

navigation program by satellite, and Global Monitoring for Environment and Security 

(GMES), the European environmental and security monitoring program—symbolize the 

debate around the dual nature of many space applications. On the one hand, the member 

states of the European Union have a clear understanding that pursuing these projects will 

make their larger effort to build a coherent European political and military structure more 

credible. In particular, given the constant reference to "security"-type applications for 
these programs, including for some military uses, the political authorities will find it 

increasingly difficult to focus on environmental, industrial, or economic issues only 

without addressing more focused security issues. But on the other hand, such an 

evolution toward more security-related space programs may strengthen some of the 

national reticence to get more involved in their development. 

Galileo is quite meaningful in this respect. The navigation and localization satellite 

program begun in the late 1990s has rapidly imposed itself at the Brussels level in the 

context of the U.S. global positioning system (GPS) domination. Since the beginning, the 

objective has always been defined to make Europe part of the precision location–related 

activities with the ability to master this particular technology to the fullest extent. 8 A 

number of studies had been published at the time demonstrating the extent to which those 

systems would become the backbone of a totally new activity with a wide array of 

possible uses in the market sector. These perspectives clearly showed how important it 

was for Europe to be a major actor in this area, both for political reasons—depending 

upon a foreign system for strategic applications was not without political significance if 

Europe was serious about becoming a major power—and for industrial and commercial 

reasons. 

In its first phase, this program, called the European Global Navigation Overlay System/ 

Global Navigation Satellite System (EGNOS/GNSS–1), was organized in the framework 

of the tripartite body composed of the European Space Agency (ESA), the European 

Commission, and Eurocontrol (the aerial traffic certification institution) with an initial 

goal to augment the performances and control the integrity of the GPS. From the start, a 

second stage of GNSS was envisioned, GNSS–2, which was expected to provide Europe 

with a fully autonomous system based on a satellite constellation that would ultimately 

become Galileo. From the European perspective, the two principles behind the system 

proposed to support GNSS–2 were the satisfaction of requirements for precision, 

availability, and reliability compatible with life-saving activities, and ensuring that the 

management of the system would be administered by a completely independent civilian 

and multinational structure with a clear responsibility and liability for any service 

disruption. 

After a number of differences of opinion between its member states were reconciled, 

Europe confirmed this position through a high-level group position expressed in 1997, 

while a European Commission document dated January 1998 defined all the action to be 

undertaken. 9 Initially, the global Galileo system had to be deployed by 2008 and required 

that Europe would emit experimental signals by 2006 on the various frequency bands 

used. In order to maintain the frequency allocations granted during the difficult 

negotiations of the May 2000 International Telecommunication Union World 

Radiocommunication Conference, it was necessary to deploy the first operational satellite 

before February 13, 2006. Fulfilling this task, a test bed payload was launched in 

December 2005, emitting its first signals on January 12, 2006. This objective, widely 

supported in Brussels, to put in place a complete European constellation of 30 satellites 

by 2008 has thus reflected a purely European self-assertive approach, with a largely 

publicized commercial side, besides obvious political interests. 
The ambiguity of this public/civilian (even commercial to some extent) arrangement 

explains the bulk of the financial troubles Galileo has had. A striking feature has to do 

with the civilian dimension of the project that clearly legitimizes Galileo in the eyes of 

the Europeans, as it goes beyond the military-only controlled nature of the American 

GPS. In particular, the enduring possibility of the United States restricting access to users 

worldwide has been perceived as a severe limitation on the free use of the GPS, as has the 

potential (even if improbable) voluntary disruption or degradation of the GPS signal. 

From solely an industrial point of view, these perspectives, even if highly unexpected, 

were not exactly synonymous with investor trust and easy fundraising. At the European 

level, such characteristics have been considered a serious limitation in the free use of the 

GPS, especially as the European institutions had in mind the industrial and commercial 

applications from the start and desired to make them the primary justification for the 

program. Then again, two goals can be mentioned: first, to allow the European service 

industry to expand, and second, to make this industry a crucial part of the building of a 

new European-wide activity. The massive legal presence of the U.S. firms on the GPSrelated services market was viewed in any case as a strongly limiting factor for European 

industry.10 The figures at stake and their constant revisions were judged convincing 

enough to propose an autonomous system that would in return make the industries more 

willing to invest in it. 

In 2002, the European Commission announced that "according to various studies that 

have been conducted, the equipment and services market resulting from the programme is 

estimated at around euro 10 billion per annum, with the creation of over 100,000 highly 

skilled jobs; conversely, if Europe misses out these new developments, many jobs would 

ultimately disappear in the electronics and aerospace sectors." 11 Lastly and most 

importantly as far as the desirability of the project for industry was concerned, a study led 

by the private consulting firm PricewaterhouseCoopers and based on updated projections 

over a period of 20 years indicated a cost/benefit ratio of 4:6, "which is higher than for 

any other infrastructure project in Europe," as noted by the European Commission. 12

As a result, the civilian and commercial aspects of GNSS and Galileo have been 

increasingly stressed, thereby confirming the implications of the tripartite EU–ESA–

Eurocontrol body in the management of the program. Both this early involvement of the 

European institutions and the ambiguity of the public/private arrangement may explain 

the bulk of the troubles Galileo has had to face recently from the financing standpoint. 

The financial scheme (called Public Private Partnership) envisioned by the steering 

institutions quoted above was based on successive public and private financing phases, 

implying some degree of return on investment through the commercialization of services 

by private entities. 

At the cost of some adjustments, especially concerning the financial burden put on 

commercial entities, this system now has to find its balance. Public money would take the 

form of a European Commission payment of roughly one-third of the amount with 

private participation covering the other two-thirds. In spring 2001, 15 firms signed a 

memorandum of understanding aimed at achieving a combined private sector 

contribution of 200 million euros for the initial development and validation phase ending 
in 2007. A Galileo Joint Undertaking (GJU) based on article 171 of the European 

Community Treaty was adopted by the Commission in June 2001 in order to create a 

single management and financing structure for the program between 2002 and 2006–

2007. A few aspects of the arrangements were watched particularly carefully, among 

which included mechanisms to avoid conflicts of interests that were the condition for the 

private sector participation. 

In July 2004, a new GNSS Supervisory Authority (GSA) was created by the European 

Union Council. It became active on January 1, 2007, to replace the GJU (which ceased its 

own activities at the end of 2006) to represent the European public authorities during the 

preparation and the exploitation phase of the program. The GSA will organize the future 

relationships between the European Union and the private operator in charge of the actual 

exploitation of the program, with the particular objective to make sure that the security 

issues associated with Galileo are fully guaranteed. 

Two main industrial groups have been formed and have competed at the European level. 

One group, Eurely, was composed of British, French, Italian, and Spanish firms around a 

core team composed by Alcatel Space, Finnmeccanica, and Hispasat, while the other 

group, INavSat, was built around the giant European electronic firm Thales and the other 

aerospace giant EADS. Confronted with two highly competitive proposals, the European 

commission eventually decided to promote the merger of these two groups to form a 

unique "commercial operator." 

For the time being, all the problems related to the Galileo budgeting calendar regarding 

the rest of the program are not solved. On its side, industry is still considering very 

cautiously the unusual nature of the early investments it has to make and is urging the 

European public entities to provide more insurance and more details on the future 

budgets as well as for the first four satellites and the rest of the space and ground 

segment. The financing scheme envisioned by the steering institutions quoted above was 

based on successive public and private financing phases, implying some degree of return 

on investment through the commercialization of services by private entities. 

European ministries of defense have not proved to be the most supportive governmental 

bodies of the member states. They were hardly in a position to support Galileo directly, 

as it was conceived as a civilian program from its inception and to its main ultimate

goals. From this perspective, the enrollment of Galileo in the "Aerospace" account of the 

6th Framework Programme for Research and Development 13 may have had the indirect 

effect of reinforcing this "civilian only" identification. Galileo could then be merely 

considered as an element of the global aerospace expenditures, themselves confronted 

with the competition from other transport budget items. As can be judged by what 

happened at the end of 2001, this particular position has had negative effects for the 

program, implying a global, even if implicit, reassessment of the "sovereignty" dimension 

embedded in it. This reassessment has been highlighted by the hesitations noted in 

Laeken in December 2001, when the transportation ministers showed themselves unable 

to agree on the amount of the public financing of Galileo, while its principle had been 

approved 3 months earlier in Edinburgh during the ESA Summit. 
In many respects, this nondecision has highlighted the relative weakness of the member 

states' political support for the program, much beyond the usual bureaucratic resistance 

manifested by financially careful ministries toward a program of more than 3 billion 

euros. High-profile personalities, rather than states' representatives, have had to squeeze 

out the importance of a positive vote for Galileo and to underscore the damage that could 

have been caused by Europe's hesitations. Carl Bildt, the former Swedish prime minister, 

has blamed "the inability of successive Swedish and Belgian presidencies of the 

European Union to resolve fully the issues around the Galileo Project," summarizing that 

"the urgent need to begin dialogue with [the] U.S. on this issue, has highlighted Europe's 

lack of coherent policy and an effective decision making structure." Adding to this severe 

judgment, Loyola de Palacio, then European Transport and Energy Commissioner, 

declared at the time that "what we are lacking is a decision by the Governments of the 

European Union. The problem is not one of cost, but of [politics]."14

This need for a "political transcription" of the utility of Galileo for Europe has been 

somewhat confirmed by the mild position adopted by countries usually judged as the 

warmest supporters of Galileo. Again, the military side especially expressed a measured 

approach. European military choices are always made in the context of tight national 

defense budgets, and space expenditures have never ranked high on their priority list, 

except in the case of strictly controlled programs related to national sovereignty, such as 

Helios. It must be noted that the Commission in early communications has always taken 

care not to put aside the military dimension of Galileo: 

And last but not least, Galileo will underpin the common European defense policy that 

the Member States have decided to establish. There is no question here of coming into 

conflict with the United States which is and will remain our ally, but simply a question of 

putting and end to a situation of dependence. If the EU finds it necessary to undertake a 

security mission that the U.S. does not consider to be in its interest, it will be impotent 

unless it has the satellite navigation technology that is now indispensable. Although 

designed primarily for civilian applications, Galileo will also give the EU a military 

capability.15

Obviously, attaining balance on this subject is a delicate matter in the European 

institutional context. By posing the question of the military use of Galileo at the end of 

2001, the United States directly connected the project to the traditional Achilles' heel of 

the European construction process. 

Significantly, the strongest reactions to what were considered as American pressure s to 

sink the project came from the European institutions. For example, Antonio Rodota, then 

head of the European Space Agency, affirmed that he was convinced the United States 

was aiming at destabilizing Galileo in order to keep a monopoly on satellite navigation 

activity worldwide. On her side, Loyola de Palacio exhorted the governments to keep 

their objectives clearly defined so they would be ready to definitively set the technical 

characteristics of the Galileo signal at the World Radiocommunication Conference in 

2003. 
As far as the U.S. (and NATO16) security preoccupations were concerned, they were 

shared by some European ministries of defense that insisted the military security aspects 

would obviously have to be taken into account in the management of the European 

system. In fact, in full compliance with those security requirements at the member states 

level, the structure of the service brought by Galileo is based on the existence of several 

types of services. One of these, the public regulated service, will rely on a highly secured 

and precise signal devoted to an array of governmental activities, including civil security 

uses or police uses. This means that Galileo will be organized by performance (according 

to the precision and the reliability required by type of user) rather than the way the GPS 

is—that is, by nature (along a military/civilian use line). Including the military uses in 

this wide category of public-only uses, with military standards as minimum requirements, 

would have to deal with a control and management structure that will be handled directly 

at the European level. But as mentioned above, the possible military use of Galileo 

remains a very contentious issue in Europe. 

In any case, the global response made to the U.S. authorities about the secure 

management of the program was hoped to be sufficient to allay their fears in the security 

management domain and to stop worrying about jamming a future allied asset. Moreover, 

the technical possibility seems to have been successfully demonstrated that the Galileo 

signal would not interfere with the GPS. Moreover, the choice of frequencies close to 

those used by the GPS has even proven to be a prerequisite in the eyes of the ministries of 

defense of the member states, who insisted at the European level that Galileo would have 

to be interoperable with the U.S. system. 

The increasingly frequent references to enlarged security requirements may help the idea 

of common European security and military requirements to assert itself, including in the 

military domain. One may have seen a first sign in this direction in the so-called Baveno 

Manifesto, which announced this new initiative in 1998 to deal with the need for 

environmental monitoring.17 Strictly associated with environment monitoring in the first 

place, the notion of security contained in the official program label has rapidly been 

enlarged. A 1999 European Commission document changed the name of the GMES 

program by transforming it from "Environmental Security" to "Environment and 

Security." This text insisted on the security of "individuals and nations," underlining "the 

environment problems . . . [that] could lead to an international conflict."18 Finally, a 2001 

report by the Joint Task Force, a newly created supervising body of the EU and ESA 

space-related activities, reaffirmed the importance of the security component of GMES: 

"The security and dual use dimensions of GMES have not been adequately investigated 

so far [which must lead to] establish an appropriate dialog between the Directorate 

General of the Commission, the Secretariat of the European CFSP, ESA and relevant 

authorities in Member States [and] determine the future role of ESA with respect to these 

issues."19 In this document, "Joint Task Force Report" refers to the Petersberg tasks, 

adopted in 1992, which include humanitarian and rescue missions, peacekeeping, and the 

use of combat force in crisis situations, including peacemaking, and which form the core 

of the European Security and Defense Policy. 
For its promoters, GMES must be considered as a useful tool for civil security, including 

missions dealing with operational forecasting, hazards mitigation, damage assessment, 

rescue operations, and health and food problems, with some predicting capabilities. The 

relationship of these missions with possible military situations under the auspices of the 

Petersberg tasks naturally makes GMES a potentially relevant tool for the military actors 

or planners. Beyond the humanitarian dimension, other possible uses of GMES can also 

be envisioned in the field of security, in particular for a contribution to the verification of 

some disarmament treaties. Indeed, progress made in the field of the sensors, especially 

in spectral resolution (hyperspectral techniques), along with constantly improved 

computing techniques clearly make programs such as GMES better adapted to detect and 

analyze fine artifacts such as industrial effluents. It must be recalled that analyzing 

industrial pollution remains one of the program's primary missions related to the Kyoto 

protocol on global climate change. In any event, the increasing number and variety of 

sensors on orbit will make GMES a system that, if well supported by an adapted 

information structure, will contribute to an enhanced European security. Well ahead of 

the current planning stage of the program, these views give a political content to what 

remains a scientific endeavor aimed at a better European coherence in the field on the 

environmental security and that remains financed by the research and development 

budget at this time. 

Considering the political sensitivity of the subject, the potential association of GMES 

with an ongoing European military destiny has not help to clarify the future of the 

program. GMES is run by the European Commission, which defined an action plan 

composed of a 2-year initial period started in 2001, followed in 2003 by a capacity 

buildup period, with an operational system envisioned for 2008. This process is 

collectively managed, with a relatively low-profile role for the member states. A joint 

EU-ESA decision in March 2002 announced the creation of a steering group composed of 

representatives of each state with the objective to select the national projects sent in 

response to the first scientific request for proposals issued by the Commission. In its very 

early stage and rather oriented toward pure research programs, the national answers are 

coordinated in the member states, which act as coordinators rather than as initiating 

actors. On its side, the European Space Agency appears as the most proactive institution 

in this project. One main task of the space agency is to bring services elements to GMES 

during the final capacity buildup phase, in order to lay the groundwork for receiving the 

data produced by GMES. 

Since November 2005, so-called GMES fast track services have been endorsed at the 

political level for three areas: land monitoring, global maritime services, and the setting 

up of a dedicated information infrastructure. The goal is to reach a preoperational stage in 

the coming years by taking benefit from existing capabilities and resources. In addition, 

the GMES project also bets on its own Sentinel satellite programs. 20

The current GMES development process shows how the strategic character of the 

program has not fully translated into a genuine common political involvement from the 

European nations in the security and defense policy, despite the efforts made by the 

European Commission in this direction. Given the expected difficulties to find a 
consensus on the security aspect of GMES, the scientific and environmental aspects of 

the program currently monopolize the European activity to develop a common 

understanding around it. In particular, the European Commission has adopted a relatively 

cautious approach on the subject to manage a project whose dual aspects are recognized 

but has not elected yet to make it an instrument of a still-elusive "collective sovereignty" 

in the European context. 

The Path of "European Security" 

Both a white paper of the European Commission issued during the autumn 200321 and the 

widely distributed Spasec Group report to the European Commission showed that a 

proper place should be found for the exiting actors, namely the ESA and the Commission, 

to allow Europe to develop a reasonable security space capability. While the European 

advances have definitely followed a pragmatic approach favoring the programs over, for 

example, collective high-level political and military thinking, it is noticeable that new 

conceptual efforts have been made by the commission and by the European Space 

Agency in the field of security since 2004. 

As far as the European Commission is concerned, a new program was introduced to 

budget a "space and security" line for the next 7 years starting from 2007. This effort has 

already been prepared for 3 years by the Preparatory Action for Security Research 

(PASR) led by the Commission. This action, supported by a few tens of millions of euros, 

has identified critical areas where research and development efforts should be 

concentrated, including in the space area, for improving the security of the European 

citizen. Not only roadmapping but also real-size experiments (such as the one 

demonstrated in the case of the ASTRO+ project, one of the PASR projects devoted to 

the study of the use of space to address security situations) have consolidated views 

linking space and security in fields like natural and manmade disasters, the protection of 

critical infrastructures, or maritime surveillance. These topics should be explored more in 

detail under the European Union 7th Framework Program for R&D that will take place 

from 2007 to 2013. In total, an average of 200 millions euros should flow annually for 

space applications devoted to European security only. Such a program should stir new 

synergies, mobilize dual competencies, and provide a first genuine European political 

base for a more security-oriented common space program. 

It is no surprise that these last years have also been the time for a more active stance from 

the part of the ESA on security-related issues. In particular, the issue of space 

surveillance has now reached a high level of priority for the agency. System architecture 

studies were started in 2007 and led to the adoption in November 2008 of an SSA 

roadmap with a first 55 million Euros spent over 3 years for preoperational studies. It is 

expected that a total amount of 620 million Euros will be spent on the European SSA 

over the next 10 years with the goal to launch the construction of a system early in the 

next decade. It is clear that such a project relates both to the need for Europe to have a 

better understanding of the vulnerabilities linked to the use of space systems and to a 

collective will to better assume the security of Europe at large, possibly enhancing global 

security by contributing to a better space surveillance system globally. 
In these two areas, dramatic steps are being made by transitioning, albeit slowly, from 

purely national systems to shared systems. These new developments could then be seen 

as confirming the signs in this direction shown by the two flagship programs mentioned 

above, with more directly applied political decisions related to the "security of the 

European citizen." Besides the collective but still hesitant efforts made in the field of 

European military space, the nascent trend toward a possible "European Space for 

Security" could well be elected as a more practicable path toward a tangible European 

spacepower. 

Conclusion 

Europeans need to decide on their future military space needs. Against a background of 

U.S. dominance of the international space environment, how does space technology 

correspond to European security interests? Military space is generally twofold. Space 

technology comprises, on the one hand, applications directly relevant to the soldier on the 

ground— intelligence systems, navigation systems, and telecommunications—that can be 

called force application systems. On the other hand, some space systems aim at defending 

the orbital domain—space surveillance and antisatellite systems—that can be called 

space control systems. 

Realistically, the "do-it-all" approach of the United States cannot be a template for 

Europe. Space control systems are irrelevant to the types of peace support missions that 

the EU aims to undertake. However, it is recognized that developing force application 

systems should increase the efficiency of European armed forces on the ground. These 

technologies are increasingly recognized as a prerequisite for future European military 

operations. First priorities for European space efforts will likely be intelligence and 

telecommunications systems. 

The BOC—the European Earth observation agreement—and NATO's nascent 

telecommunications satellite infrastructure have shown how much progress has been 

made in the right direction for the last decade. These multinational initiatives will be 

pursued and could even extend to sensitive fields such as signals intelligence/electronic 

intelligence or even early warning, considering an increasing awareness of the need to 

better assess the ballistic threat. However, this latest issue precisely set the limitations to

what may be possible from a collective standpoint in Europe. Differing political and 

military needs (for example, the different positions existing in Europe related to nuclear 

deterrence and associated needs) may make these kinds of military programs, if they have 

to exist, unreachable in Europe. 

A second increasing perspective for Europe is to promote innovative ways of using space 

applications for security in the broadest sense. In this area, current efforts undertaken by 

the European Space Agency to set up a European architecture for space surveillance and 

monitoring purposes must be noticed. Such a move is in line with this enlarged security 

concept where, in this case, monitoring of debris or space traffic will become more 

crucial for promoting the development of any space activity. It is particularly true as 

Europe positions itself slowly at the forefront of efforts to integrate military and civilian 
systems into a global space architecture that would help countries deal with a wider array 

of security challenges. Indeed, satellites dedicated to monitoring the environment (as 

envisioned by the GMES program) could also be useful for dealing with other short-term 

threats that could range from terrorist actions to insufficiently secure industrial or 

armaments installations in Eastern Europe. In such cases, both civil security and military 

planners need access to information from more flexible and responsive space systems. 

The ability to exploit an increasing amount of complex data, and produce relevant 

information for a wider array of users, should be a priority for European space efforts. 

The need to integrate space programs with other kinds of sensors and intelligencecollection systems means that Europeans should develop their own system of systems. In 

other words, military space programs may form part of an all-inclusive European security 

architecture that integrates both civil and military systems and space-based and non–

space-based technologies. This is the only way to make a complete European space 

system palatable for cash-strapped finance ministries. 

Whatever the solution, the two prerequisites for the future of European military space are 

to make the most of new technologies and to decide how to manage future security needs 

at the European level. Showing a possible way to enhance security and help Europe be a 

more capable security partner on the global scene, the notion of a European spacepower 

that would help solve these larger political issues could then legitimately take shape. 

Notes

1. As presented in the most common budget analysis comparing the supposed space military budget 

in the United States of around $20 billion, as mentioned in Patricia Figliola Moloney, U.S. 

Military Space Programs, An Overview of Appropriations and Current Issues (Washington, DC: 

Congressional Research Service, August 7, 2006), 2. This U.S. amount is compared to the 

remaining world budgets comprising the European military space budgets (of around 950 million 

euros in 2005); see the French Parliamentary Report by Sen. Henri Revol and Rep. Christian 

Cabal, Politique spatiale, l'Audace ou le Déclin (Office Parlementaire d'Evaluation des Choix 

Scientifiques et Technologiques, Assemblée Nationale, Paris, No. 3676, Sénat, No. 223, February 

7, 2007), 150, and the estimated Chinese, Indian, and Russian budgets (still kept relatively secret) 

devoted to this activity, 26–34. 

2. This episode has more or less comported with a number of national decisions that were made 

before, sometimes for the same reasons. In particular, the German decision to develop autonomous 

military SAR satellites was made in the context of the Kosovo war, with a strong desire to gain a 

better view on Central Europe by itself. Italy, with its SAR satellite Cosmo series, and the United 

Kingdom, with a renewed interest in Earth observation satellites, have also fed this trend. The 

quest for autonomy has spread far beyond the European borders, with Japan getting equipped with 

its own spy satellite in March 2003: "Japan Questions Reliability of U.S. Security Info," The New 

York Times, July 3, 2002. 

3. Another Helios 2 satellite was planned for launch in 2008. 

4. See the United Kingdom Future Air and Space Operational Concept, available at 

<www.raf.mod.uk/downloads/documents/fasoc.pdf>. 

5. On this and associated issues, see French Ministry of Defense, "Let U.S. Make More Space for our 

Defence: Strategic Guidelines for a Space Defence Policy in France and in Europe," Paris, 

February 2007, available at 

<www.defense.gouv.fr/defense/focus/donnons_plus_d_espace_a_la_defense__1>. 
6. Brigadier Général Daniel Gavoty, L'espace militaire, un projet fédérateur pour l'Union 

Européenne (Paris: Défense Nationale Review, October 2001), 79–96. 

7. European Commission, Report of the Panel of Experts on Space and Security (Brussels: European 

Commission, March 2005), available at <http:/europa.eu.int/comm./space/news/article_2262.pdf>. 

8. It must be noted that other concurrent efforts were under way in the area of the so-called 

augmentation system, such as in Japan with the Multifunctional Satellite Augmentation System, or 

in the United States with the parallel development of the Wide Area Augmentation System for 

civil aviation use in liaison with Canada. 

9. European Commission Communication, Towards a Trans-European Positioning and Navigation 

Network, January 21, 1998. Estimated at the time around 3.2 and 3.4 billion euros, the project was 

later judged to be the "equivalent to the cost of building 150 km of semi-urban motorway or a 

main tunnel for the future high-speed rail link between Lyon and Turin—assuming that the tunnel 

only has one track" as remarked by the European commission in an information note. 

10. As a RAND Corporation Report noted in 1995, "The relative breadth with which U.S. GPS 

inventions are protected around the world provide a competitive advantage to U.S. companies." 

Giving an example, the RAND Report remarked also that "while Japan has conducted R&D and 

has exploited GPS internationally, it has not protected its GPS inventions as broadly." RAND 

Corporation, The Global Positioning System: Assessing National Policies (Santa Monica, CA: 

RAND Corporation, 1995), 117. 

11. European Commission, Directorate-General for Energy and Transport, Galileo: The European 

Project on Radio Navigation by Satellite, March 26, 2002. 

12. Ibid. 

13. The Framework extended through the end of 2006. 

14. Carl Bildt and Loyola de Palacio, as quoted in Satellite News, January 21, 2002. 

15. European Commission, Directorate-General for Energy and Transport, March 26, 2002. 

16. Robert Bell, former advisor for strategic negotiations to President Bill Clinton and then NATO 

Assistant Secretary General for Defence Support, confirmed, "NATO has not taken a position 

either for or against Galileo. . . . That said, NATO does have a very clear interest in making sure 

that, if Galileo is eventually deployed, it does not interfere with or impair NATO's access to the 

significant military advantage afforded NATO forces and that NATO is able, if required, to deny a 

potential adversary's access to the satellite positioning services available from any other satellite 

navigation services during a conflict." In this respect, and fully in line with the U.S worries, the 

necessity to be able to jam Galileo stemming from a supposed lack of security guidance due to the 

"civilian" character of Galileo has been mentioned. R. Bell, "GPS and Galileo—Capabilities and 

Compatibility," address at European Satellite for Security Conference, Brussels, June 17–18, 

2002. 

17. Global Monitoring for Environment and Security: A Manifesto for a European Initiative (ASI, 

BNSC, CNES, DLR, EARSC, ESA, Eumetsat, European Commission), 1998. 

18. Global Monitoring for Environment and Security , Space Advisory Group 99/3, European 

Commission, December 7, 1999. 

19. Joint Task Force Report , September 2001. 

20. These Sentinel satellites will be regrouped in four families: c-band radar satellites (Sentinel-1) to 

be orbited between 2008 and 2010; high spectral sensitivity satellites (Sentinel-2) also envisioned 

for launch during the 2008–2010 period; maritime surveillance satellites (Sentinel-3); and 

atmospheric satellite satellites (Sentinel-4 and -5). 

21. Available at <http://europa.eu.int/comm/space/whitepaper/index_en.html>. 
Chapter 26:

Emerging Actors

Randall R. Correll

The world of the 21st century is radically different from that of the previous century. As 

the new century approached, the world appeared to be a much more uncertain place. The 

traditional balance of power has been dramatically disturbed. Accelerating technology 

catalyzed economic change as new nations and international corporations competed in 

the interconnected global marketplace. The dramatic advances in information technology 

united and empowered transnational peoples and ideologies beyond the constraint of any 

single government. Where global powers had faded, new regional powers arose with the 

potential for influence in the new global economy and information grid. 

Spacepower as an Instrument of Global and Regional Influence 

As many nations and states reconstitute1 themselves in this new century, they pursue 

spacepower to help achieve their economic, political, and cultural objectives. While the 

traditional powers long ago developed routine space capabilities and operations of vital 

importance, many nations are now only beginning to add such capabilities to their 

repertoire of national power. In doing so, they have applied innovative, frugal, and 

cooperative approaches. Spacepower fits naturally within the goals and ambitions of 

emerging powers. Economic strength is very dependent on information technologies: this 

includes collecting information on geography and environment and in communicating 

information and political messages. Thus, the growing interest in spacepower derives 

from growing economic aspirations and political influence, and this will unsettle the 

balance of power of the formerly unchallenged global leaders. Therefore, it is instructive 

to consider how new and emerging space powers, referred to in this paper simply as 

emerging space powers, are using space to achieve their aims, especially as they build 

alliances with the established space powers on one hand and, on the other, with neighbors 

who do not yet have access to spacepower but want to acquire it. 

As less developed nations grow in economic, military, and political might, the existing 

balance of power will be threatened and possibly weakened. Regional rivals will emerge 

where global superpowers formerly dominated, and new conflicts and tensions will arise. 

It is quite likely that the increasing activity of spacefaring nations will make space less 

secure in the near term. Already, certain states and transnational groups have engaged in 

the jamming and hijacking of satellite communications, intent on blocking or 

broadcasting propaganda and strategic messages. Yet once the spacepower of these 

emerging actors is integrated into the security apparatus of strong international partners, 

the peace and security of the world should be significantly enhanced. 
As the United States considers the application and evolution of spacepower as part of its 

overall strategic influence and leadership, it should beware of challenges to its 

preeminence in space and should seek opportunities for beneficial cooperation. Many 

other nations are eager to engage the United States in diplomatic, economic, and cultural 

affairs, and space is an attractive tool with which to do so. 

Higher Aspirations Abroad 

The United States primarily thinks of security in terms of threat warning and force 

projection. These are very important functions, of course, and derive from our Cold War 

heritage, which is why many of our space systems have been highly classified systems. 

However, most of the world's spacefaring nations pursued space initially from 

commercial and civil interests and more recently have been extending their application to 

meet security needs. This encompasses a much broader spectrum of activities than the 

U.S. space security community typically addresses and offers many more options for 

fostering international cooperation, strengthening alliances, and building common interest 

in foreign affairs. 

Space technology, and technology in general, is powerful in effect, but it is not inherently 

dangerous. 2 More importantly, space technology is now pervasive around the world. Any 

security strategy that relies on denying an adversary access to technology must be 

recognized as being unrealistic and doomed to failure. The existing space powers, with 

the notable exception of the United States,3 ,4 openly leverage their spacepower through 

international cooperation and engagement to further their economic interests and national 

security. The international space market is a bazaar of opportunities for emerging space 

powers to buy, sell, and barter important space goods and services to advance their 

national interest. 

To underscore this point, consider the International Space Station project with 

participants from the United States, Russia, Canada, Japan, and the European Space 

Agency (ESA). This is by far the most immense international space project, with a 

cumulative budget approaching $100 billion. Its appeal is prestige on the world stage. 

China aspires to join, as does recently emerging space power India, but so far continues 

to be excluded. Emerging space powers are eager to provide an astronaut, who then 

generally becomes an important icon in their homelands, inspiring their youth to excel in 

technical studies. Participation in the program represents the cathedral of prestige, not the 

bazaar of everyday trade where the more pragmatic space applications are quietly being 

developed and traded within the international community of existing and emerging space 

powers. 5

We are beginning to see interesting examples of where emerging space powers are 

bumping up against established ones and their emerging regional neighbors. Japan, 

concerned about military developments in North Korea, has launched its own 

reconnaissance satellites suitable for collecting high-resolution images. This has alarmed 

the North Korean government, which calls these actions aggressive. On August 31, 1998, 

North Korea launched what was believed to be a ballistic missile test; Pyongyang later 
announced it had attempted its first satellite launch. Israel has become rather expert at 

producing small, lightweight optical imaging systems for satellite missions. The United 

Arab Emirates is seeking bidders for its own civil-military communications satellite. Iran 

has been accused of jamming commercial communications satellites that were 

broadcasting allegedly seditious programming produced by Iranian expatriates in the 

United States. Canada has become the world's leader in many robotic and autonomous 

space technologies that could be used in space control satellites. A number of smaller 

nations have collaborated with Surrey Satellite Technologies of the United Kingdom to 

learn how to build and operate small satellites. China, Russia, and European nations 

actively seek out cooperative space projects with each other and with developing nations. 

India has developed its remote sensing capabilities to such sophisticated levels that it now 

sells data for environmental monitoring and land management to nations around the 

globe, including the United States. 

What is important in these events is that along with the dangerous ambitions of some 

developing nations to have nuclear weapons and ballistic missiles, emerging nations also 

recognize the strategic and pragmatic value of being a space power. North Korea, Iran, 

and Israel—like many other countries—are interested in exploiting the dual-use nature of 

space for economic, civil, security, and international affairs. 

It is difficult to accurately assess the total spending for national space programs, but table 

26–1 estimates the approximate level of investment for the world's space programs.6 The 

estimates are based on civil space spending (not including dedicated military space 

spending by the United States, Russia, and China). For the remaining countries, which 

have dual-use space programs, the estimates also include spending on security-related 

applications of their space capabilities. Limited funds mandate that emerging space 

powers selectively prioritize modest but effective space capabilities to serve their national 

interests. 

Table 26–1. Estimated Budgets of Leading Space Powers

Nation 2008 Budget

(USD millions)

Space Launch Capable

United States/National 

Aeronautics and Space 

Administration

17,300 Yes

European Space Agency 4,270 Yes

Japan* 3,500 Yes

China 1,700 Yes

Russia 1,540 Yes

France 970 Yes

Italy 910

India* 860 Yes

Germany 440
South Korea* 250 In development

Canada* 250

Brazil* 130 In development

United Kingdom 80

Israel* 80 Yes

* = emerging space power

It is helpful to consider space powers based on their regional dynamics and based on the 

level of space capability. Table 26–2 outlines a geographic region versus level-ofcapability matrix. The established space superpowers include the United States, Russia, 

ESA, and China and are shown on the first tier of the matrix. The emerging space powers 

can roughly be grouped into categories based on level of capability: expanding space 

powers, emerging space powers, and emerging space users. Finally, the bottom of the 

matrix shows a tier of space-enabling entities consisting of commercial Internet 

companies and commercial space companies that are making the rudiments of 

spacepower products and services affordable and pervasive. 

Table 26–2. Space Powers: Geographic Region versus Level of Capability Matrix

Americas Europe East Asia Middle 

East/Africa

South Asia

Global and 

Spacefaring

United States European 

Space 

Agency

Russia

China

Expanding 

Space Powers

Japan

India

Emerging 

Regional Space 

Powers

Canada

Brazil South 

Korea

Israel

Iran Pakistan

Emerging 

Space Users

Chile

Venezuela

North 

Korea

Turkey

Saudi Arabia

Nigeria

Space Enabling Google Earth (as a proxy for the commercialization of cyber-spacepower)

What do the emerging space powers have to tell us about spacepower? Through 

necessity, they pursue innovative approaches that may prove novel or even contradictory 

to standard practices of the few established space powers, and thus provide interesting 

case studies in the fuller understanding of spacepower theory.7 An interesting historical 
analogy can be used in this regard. The Space Commission report of 2001 referred to the 

impending threat of a "space Pearl Harbor"8 where a complacent U.S. space infrastructure 

was vulnerable to a dramatic first strike by a peer competitor. A different analogy has 

been suggested: we may be more likely to experience a "space Shays' Rebellion," 

analogous to the early years of the United States, where dissatisfaction with the Articles 

of Confederation led to a new Constitution that better fit the diverse needs of the 

burgeoning national political and economic tableau.9 A brief survey of the diverse 

activities of emerging space powers will give us insight into the dynamics of spacepower 

as they employ it, and at the same time point out opportunities for the established space 

powers to better engage with emerging competitors in support of national goals and 

interests. 

Emerging Spacepower's Upward Trajectory 

The Americas 

The dynamic in the Western Hemisphere is dominated by the United States and its space 

capabilities. North America is stable and technologically advanced, while South America 

is aspiring to catch up to the modern, high-tech economies of the more developed nations. 

In North America, Canada has excelled in several niche technologies for space 

applications. In South America, Brazil leads the way with a fairly mature aeronautics 

enterprise, but with disappointing progress thus far in space. 

Canada. Canada has excelled in remote sensing with its Radarsat program that provides 

all-weather, day-night imaging capability. With a resolution of about 10 meters, the 

Radarsat-1 system is applicable for land-use studies, but not for the high-resolution 

images needed for many intelligence and military functions. In December 2007, Canada's 

Radarsat-2 follow-on was launched to orbit; it provides an improved 3-meter resolution 

capability and adds some security-quality applications to commercial and civil uses. 

Canada also excels at space robotics, having built the robotic arm for the U.S. space 

shuttle and the International Space Station. Canadian participation in the September 9, 

2006, space shuttle mission to the International Space Station included an astronaut, the 

deployment of the extension to the Canadarm robotic arm on the International Space 

Station, the attendance by the Canadian ambassador to the United States at the launch 

ceremonies, and a significant public relations program broadcast throughout Canada as 

they enjoyed the national pride of their significant contributions. 

Canadian industrial vendors were selected to provide critical robotic technologies for the 

National Aeronautics and Space Administration's (NASA's) Hubble space telescope 

repair missions, including the final servicing mission completed in May 2009. They 

provided robotic manipulators for the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency's 

Orbital Express satellite servicing experiment. And they provide a miniaturized laser 

range finder that the Air Force Research Laboratory used on its XSS–11 space 

rendezvous and autonomous proximity operations experiment. 
That Canadian technical expertise in autonomous space operations and manipulation are 

best in the world should astound national security specialists. These technologies are 

critical elements of any potential on-orbit space control system. Such systems are often 

attributed to alleged U.S. space weapons programs. In fact, these technologies are not 

only readily available from Canada, but also the premier space organizations of the U.S. 

Government chose Canadian technology over that provided by U.S. developers. 

The Canadian Ministry of Defense also is pursuing a small satellite called SAPPHIRE, a 

microsatellite weighing approximately 130 kilograms, to scan the skies for space objects 

and contribute data to the U.S. space object catalog. This would be a contribution under 

the North American Aerospace Command treaty. 

In August 2008, Canada's leading aerospace company, MacDonald, Dettwiler, and 

Associates (MDA), successfully placed into orbit a constellation of five microsatellites 

call RapidEye for their customer, RapidEye AG in Germany.10 RapidEye provides 

multispectral data suitable for land use assessments, and with the rapid revisit rates of the 

five microsatellites, the constellation provides extraordinarily large area coverage (up to 4 

million square kilometers per day) or provides rapid revisit. This rate makes it quite 

useful to detect changes in ground coverage, albeit on a 6-square-meter scale, that is 

useful for security purposes. Indeed, RapidEye AG, has recently signed an agreement 

with a U.S. company to resell the data in the U.S. market to defense, intelligence, and 

homeland security customers. RapidEye AG had earlier signed an agreement with 

Sovzond JSC of Moscow as the distributor of its data to the Russian government. This is 

an example of innovative collaboration between regional emerging space powers to 

provide a useful, affordable product to existing global space powers. 

The current outlook in the Canadian space program is somewhat ambivalent: while it 

enjoys participation with the U.S. space program, it also increasingly chafes under U.S. 

control and interference. Canada's ability to do international business in the space sector 

is frequently complicated and challenged by U.S. export control regulators. A feeling of 

frustration is now motivating Canada to pursue stronger collaborative agreements with 

nations other than the United States. 

Recent attempts by U.S. corporations to buy MDA and its Radarsat product line have 

caused the Canadian government to examine the importance and cost of its spacepower 

ambitions. This introspection has led to the emphatic declaration that Canadian 

investment in space capabilities will remain in Canadian hands. 

Brazil. Despite having a world-class aeronautics capability with the Embraer 

corporation,11 Brazil has struggled to develop its space industry. As early as 1964, Brazil 

began development of the Sondra series of sounding rockets. Construction of their 

Alcântara launch site began in 1982. Alcântara is only two degrees south of the equator 

and provides ideal energy efficiency for launch into geosynchronous orbits. Brazil's first 

launch from Alcântara occurred on February 21, 1990, with the sounding rocket Sonda 2. 

Unfortunately, on August 22, 2003 the explosion of the developmental VLS space 

launcher on the launch pad killed 21 people. In a courageous and determined effort, 
Brazil was able to follow this disaster with a successful suborbital launch into space in 

October 2004. 

Brazil is looking to leverage its ideal equatorial launch site location by providing 

commercial launch base services from Alcântara. In 2003, contracts were signed to 

launch the Ukrainian Tsyklon-4, with discussions under way with Russia, Israel, and 

China to use the site. 

The Brazilian space program was transferred to the newly created Brazilian Space 

Agency in 1994. While the Alcântara launch site is operated by the military, there are 

plans to build a neighboring facility specifically for Brazil's civilian space agency. Brazil 

is also developing an indigenous satellite manufacturing capability, most often working 

closely with the United States. Difficulties over missile launch technology export controls 

led the Brazilian space program to expand cooperative activities with the French space 

program, and additionally, to recognize the benefits of signing on to the Missile 

Technology Control Regime in 1994. 

Brazil's first satellite, an environmental data collecting satellite, was put into space in 

1993 using the Orbital Sciences Corporation Pegasus commercial launch vehicle. A 

second data collecting spacecraft was placed into orbit in 1998, also by a Pegasus. Thus, 

Brazil is making progress on developing spacecraft manufacturing capability, while its 

launch vehicle capability has so far made only modest progress. 

In the meantime, Brazil has been cooperating with other spacefaring nations to leverage 

foreign technology. Brazil has been working with China to operate remote sensing 

satellites for land use and environmental monitoring. The first satellites, China-Brazil 

Earth Research Satellite (CBERS)–1 in 1999 and CBERS–2 in 2003, were built and 

launched by China; select data is now shared with Brazil, and operation of the satellite 

was turned over to Brazil 2 years after initial operations. Subsequent satellites called 

Earth Resources Satellite-02B and CBERS–3 will be coproduced by Brazil, helping to 

mature their indigenous satellite manufacturing capability.12 More recently, Brazil has 

reached an agreement with the French national space agency, CNES, to codevelop a 

Brazilian design of a small satellite bus. 13

Chile. The unique geography of Chile as it drapes along the great length of the Pacific 

coast of South America is a natural fit with space-delivered capabilities. Chile has 

pursued cooperative military space projects with the United States for reconnaissance 

capabilities, but the United States has been reluctant to cooperate. In 2007, the Chilean 

defense minister was considering a solicitation for Chile's own Earth observation 

satellite. 

Venezuela . Venezuela is most notable as an emerging spacepower user in that its oil 

resources make it attractive to existing space powers eager to trade space capabilities for 

access to oil. Venezuela is considering the purchase of a communications satellite from 

China for indigenous communications services. This agreement is likely part of a 
portfolio of activities related to China's interest in securing access to Venezuela's oil 

supplies. 

East Asia 

There is a new space race developing in Asia between China and India. It is not yet 

global in scope, as was the first space race between the United States and the Soviet 

Union, but rather a race for regional influence. For the most part, these programs have 

been very pragmatic and measured. But there have been recent signs of grander ambitions 

through space exploration programs. This competition will attract other nations in Asia 

and around the world to posture for opportunities to cooperate and build common interest 

with China and India. In East Asia, Japan is a well-developed space power expanding 

into space security applications, and South Korea is using space to complement its 

diverse and ambitious push into high-technology infrastructure and commerce. 

Japan. A survey of these nations begins with the already established but expanding space 

power of Japan. It has had indigenous launch capability, has built its own 

telecommunications satellites, and has participated in international human spaceflight 

programs. What is emerging is a willingness to deploy space systems to aid its national 

security. 

Japan has continued to develop its space launch capability for commercial and civil 

purposes. The H–2 launcher and follow-on systems provide significant launch capability. 

Japan's efforts have been closely tied to participation in civil space exploration with 

NASA and other civil space agencies. Participation in military space activities is 

prevented by national law, but the test launch by North Korea in 1998 of a missile that 

traversed Japanese territory catalyzed the Japanese government to begin a reconnaissance 

satellite program for national security purposes. Japan first launched its own 

reconnaissance satellites suitable for collecting high-resolution images for intelligence 

purposes in March 2003. This has alarmed the North Korean government, which calls 

these actions aggressive. 

Nonetheless, Japanese national security space activities continue. The information 

gathering satellite K2 was successfully launched September 11, 2006, by an H–2A rocket 

from the Tanegashima Space Center and will provide 1-meter imaging capability. Japan 

most recently launched an electro-optical imaging satellite in September 2006 and a radar 

imaging satellite in February 2007. 

Besides remote sensing for reconnaissance purposes, Japan has taken steps to expand the 

security dimension of its space policy: 

On May 21, 2008, Japan's Basic Law of Outer Space was passed, for the 

first time allowing the country to use space assets for defensive military 

purposes. The bill modified the Japanese interpretation of using space "for 

peaceful purposes only." The new interpretation conforms with policies of 

other spacefaring nations and will allow Japan's government to develop 
military satellites for defensive purposes. In addition, the new law will 

place all space-related projects into a unified program for better 

coordination.14

The most recent launch by the North Koreans on April 5, 2009—alleged by their 

government as a peaceful space launch—managed only to reenter far out in the Pacific 

Ocean after passing over Japan. Despite widespread international outrage and calls for 

action against North Korea, none have been taken thus far. In June 2009, Japan approved 

plans to develop its own missile warning satellites. 

Japan, long the sole space power in East Asia, now has rivals. It will be interesting to see 

how the Japanese realign their cooperative space activities as the Chinese and Indian 

space programs become prominent in the region. 

South Korea. In the aftermath of the Korean war and the treaty that led to the division of 

Korea into northern and southern states, the Republic of Korea has achieved an amazing 

transformation from one of the world's poorest countries to one of the leading high-tech 

economies featuring bullet trains, new superhighways, and extensive broadband network 

infrastructure.15 South Korea competes economically with the two dominant regional and 

global economies of Japan and China. It also has the significant security concern of an 

unpredictable and sometimes menacing North Korea apparently intent on developing 

nuclear weapons and ballistic missile delivery systems, along with an asserted space 

program. 

South Korea has invested significantly in space technologies as a means in itself and as a 

way to inspire a high-tech workforce. 16 The space program is under the purview of the 

Ministry of Science and Technology and is managed by the Korean Aerospace Research 

Institute. South Korea plans to increase its space budget from $250 million to $500 

million. With a gross domestic product per person about half that of the United States and 

other leading developed nations, their budget is approaching $1 billion in effective value. 

South Korea has already built over 10 satellites, mostly microsatellites, but with 

increasing size and capability as they continue to develop. South Korea soon plans to 

launch the Arirang-3A, a military and civilian dual-use, high-resolution satellite with 

optical and infrared imaging capabilities. This follows the launch of the Arirang-2 on July 

28, 2006. The Arirang satellite series, also known as the KOMPSAT series, provides 

images with 1-meter ground resolution or better, suitable for reconnaissance purposes, 

which is especially important to the South Koreans to provide transparency into military 

capabilities and operations in North Korea. South Korea previously relied on highresolution imagery from the United States, but continues to pursue an indigenous 

capability. 

South Korea also has purchased a multipurpose communications, oceanography, and 

meteorology satellite, COMS–1, from EADS-Astrium in Europe. The spacecraft is 

intended to be launched to geostationary orbit on an Ariane 5 booster and will provide 

South Korea with communications connectivity and awareness of ocean environment 

monitoring that will be useful for commercial fishing and weather forecasting. 
To date, the South Koreans have launched their spacecraft on commercial launch vehicles 

of other countries, most notably Russia. To develop indigenous launch capability, the 

South Koreans are building a launch complex on an island off the south coast of the 

mainland. The new Naro Space Center is intended to launch the KSLV–1 launch vehicle 

beginning in the summer of 2009. The vehicle will be capable of launching 100-kilogram 

microsatellites into low-Earth orbit. Although of limited capability, it would provide 

needed reconnaissance and environmental capabilities in an affordable manner. 

The South Koreans are also pursuing human spaceflight through cooperation with the 

Russian space program. South Korean spaceflyer So-yeon Yi arrived at the International 

Space Station on April 8, 2008. Despite the cost effectiveness of cooperating with the 

Russian space program, the Koreans have been actively pursuing a closer relationship 

with the U.S. space program and NASA. The Koreans have designed a number of 

experiments that could be flown on the International Space Station and have approached 

NASA in hopes of an agreement to have U.S. astronauts operate the experiment on board. 

The South Koreans have recently obtained formal agreements with NASA to explore 

cooperative activities. Seoul signed an agreement with NASA in late 2008 to boost 

cooperation in space science and exploration.17 Although earlier engagements with 

NASA met with limited results, this recently signed agreement had its impetus in a high 

level of engagement by South Korean president Lee Myung-bak, who held summit talks 

with U.S President George W. Bush.

18

North Korea . For some years now, all eyes have been on North Korea and its 

development of nuclear weapons and ballistic missile systems. However, on August 31, 

1998, something unexpected happened. After the launch of what was at first believed to 

be a ballistic missile test, North Korea announced the launch of its first satellite. Despite 

these claims, no foreign observer ever confirmed that North Korea had in fact launched a 

satellite to orbit. While the success of the alleged space launch is doubtful, the attempt 

was plausibly real. 

Another alleged space launch in April 2009 on a Taepodong-1 missile resulted only in the 

splashdown of its payload far out into the Pacific after again flying directly over Japan. 

This event caused quite a bit of alarm in Japan, the United States, and many other 

nations. Despite calls by many for severe consequences for the antagonistic launch, the 

international community and the United States have yet to take any action, and it is not 

clear that they would be fully justified in doing so. It was, after all, according to the North 

Korean government, a space launch attempt for peaceful purposes. 

As international attention focuses on the threat of North Korea's nuclear weapons 

program, and especially their delivery vehicles, this will likely discourage other nations 

from cooperating with them on space capabilities. While North Korea appears to be 

exercising its fledgling spacepower with only a phantom space program, it is not clear 

that this is a sustainable strategy or how the international community can best address 

these provocations. 
South Asia 

India is in many ways the most interesting emerging space power. While its entry into 

space is not recent, its patient approach has reached a point of critical mass at which it 

has begun to reshape the regional balance of spacepower in Asia. Pakistan's modest 

efforts in space are insufficient to challenge India's dominance, but enough to 

complement Pakistan's nuclear arsenal as a check against Indian hegemony. India also 

provides some of the most interesting opportunities for space cooperation with the United 

States. Similarly, partnering with the U.S. space program provides India with 

opportunities for more ambitious space exploration activities than they could afford on 

their own. In light of this reciprocal opportunity, the U.S. and Indian space programs take 

a central place in each other's international space partnerships. 19

India . India's space research efforts began in the 1960s and were mainly within the 

Soviet sphere during the 1970s and 1980s. They launched their first satellite in 1975. The 

overall approach of the Indian space program is very pragmatic and focuses on national 

communications, enabling educations, and remote sensing for agricultural and 

environmental concerns. India is beginning to commercialize its launch capability, 

including a recent agreement to launch an Israeli reconnaissance satellite. It is actively 

pursuing microsatellite technology for low-cost space missions. A lunar orbiting mission, 

Chandrayaan, was launched in October 2008 and began India's participation in the new 

space exploration efforts of the United States and other countries. 

While the focus of the Indian space program is to provide benefit to its people, India also 

intends to use its space program as a tool of foreign policy. In the January 2004 

agreement between the United States and India, the presidents of the two countries stated 

their intentions to strengthen and expand cooperation. This explicitly included 

participation in civil space cooperation. The new strategic partnership between the United 

States and India has the potential to be the turning point around which a new geopolitical 

balance of power might form. A key element in this partnership—U.S.-India space 

cooperation—will most likely become a defining relationship for space cooperation 

around which other spacefaring nations will posture their international space cooperation 

strategies. The central position of India in the Asian continent, its burgeoning economic 

growth, and its wealth of human capital will be crucial assets in achieving U.S. objectives 

in space and in broader objectives in global security. 

The Indian space program is considered to be the fifth largest, coming in behind the 

United States, Russia, Europe, and China. Their annual budget is about US $675 million, 

and given their relatively low-cost workforce, this is equivalent to a multi-billion-dollar

program in more developed nations such as the United States, France, or Japan. India's 

first satellite in 1975 provided communications to remote parts of the country on an 

experimental basis. Continuing a very pragmatic approach, this was later followed by 

remote sensing and weather satellites. Through buying foreign technology where needed 

and pursuing a parallel path of developing indigenous space technology, India's space 

capability has grown steadily over the years. 
The Indian space program is very much a government-executed program, but the 

government has begun to build a private sector industrial base. In 1992, the Indian Space 

Research Organization (ISRO) established the Antrix Corporation Limited for the global 

marketing and sales of Indian remote sensing satellite data. In anticipation of cooperation 

with the United States and other nations in both civil and commercial space activities, 

ISRO has made efforts to increase security and access controls at its various facilities to 

comply with anticipated requirements of export control regimes. 

India has developed two primary launch vehicles. The Polar Space Launch Vehicle 

(PSLV) can launch a 1,500-kilogram payload to 600-kilometer polar orbits. Thus, the 

PSLV is ideal for launching remote sensing satellites. The PSLV–CA launch of April 

2009 marked the twelfth consecutive operational launch of the vehicle. Previous PSLV 

payloads have included 10 small satellites deployed from one launch in April 2008; the 

Chandrayaan lunar probe; six Indian remote sensing satellites to polar orbit; a 

meteorological satellite, KALPANA–1, to geosynchronous orbit; as well as a wide range 

of small satellites from other states including Germany, South Korea, Belgium, 

Indonesia, Argentina, Italy, Israel, Japan, Canada, the Netherlands, Norway, Switzerland, 

Turkey, Singapore, and France. 

India has been developing a more powerful launch vehicle configuration for access to 

geosynchronous orbits. The Geosynchronous Space Launch Vehicle (GSLV) is derived 

from the PSLV central core with additional liquid-propellant strap-on boosters and a 

cryogenic upper stage. Following the second successful test flight of the GSLV Mark I in 

2003, India is now one of six countries able to launch a 2,000-kilogram satellite into 

geostationary orbit. To reach geosynchronous orbit, the GSLV relies on an upper stage 

vehicle powered by a Russian RD56M cryogenic propulsion system. 

The joint agreement that enabled the Indians to purchase the formerly Soviet propulsion 

system was temporarily sidetracked after the dissolution of the Soviet Union in 1991. The 

GSLV project also ran into problems when the United States imposed sanctions against 

India over nuclear technology proliferation concerns. In the last few years, cooperation 

with the Russians has resumed, and U.S. sanctions have been relaxed. In the interim, 

however, India had entered into a program to develop an indigenous cryogenic upper 

stage. That work is nearing completion, and the first flight of the new upper stage was 

expected in July 2009. 

The principle focus of the Indian space program has been to provide communications and 

broadcast capabilities where land-based infrastructure has not yet reached remote regions. 

The Indian National Satellite System (INSAT) is a series of satellites to deliver satellite 

communications. The latest of these, INSAT–4A, was launched in December 2005 

aboard an Ariane launch vehicle into geosynchronous orbit. India has great interest in 

using satellite communications to support its national education initiatives: 

EDUSAT is the first Indian satellite designed and developed exclusively for serving the 

educational sector. It is mainly intended to meet the demand for an interactive satellite 

based distance education system for the country. It strongly reflects India's commitment 
to use space technology for national development, especially for the development of the 

population in remote and rural locations. 20

While developing its indigenous capabilities, India continues to pursue international 

commercial markets for special capabilities. The Antrix commercial arm of ISRO 

recently teamed with Astrium Satellites of Europe for small telecom satellites, which in 

many cases provide affordable capability right-sized for a niche market application. ISRO 

earlier approached the Boeing Corporation in the United States, but discussions collapsed 

due to U.S. technology transfer concerns. 

India is also exploring means to use satellite communications to augment existing 

navigation systems. Wide-area augmentation schemes use existing satellite navigation 

signals, such as from the Global Positioning System or the future Galileo system, and 

provide corrections based on fixed ground locations. These corrections can then be 

broadcast over any satellite communications system to provide improved accuracy to 

satellite navigation users. India is also planning on deploying their own dedicated 

navigation satellites using rubidium atomic clocks purchased from the French company 

SpectraTime. These satellites will provide regional augmentation for navigation in 

conjunction with existing global space-based navigation systems. 

The Indian remote sensing satellite system began with the launch of its first satellite in 

1988. It consists of a series of remote sensing satellites for imaging, cartography, natural 

resource mapping, meteorology, and oceanography. This system has been modernized to 

the present series of satellites. RESOURCESAT–1 was launched into polar orbit in 2003 

and carries a suite of multispectral sensors in the visible and near-infrared suitable for 

land-use and resource studies. The system provides 5-meter-resolution Earth images in 3-

color mode and 2.5-meter-resolution Earth images in monochromatic mode. 

CARTOSAT–1 was launched in May 2005 into a polar orbit and carries two 

panchromatic imaging cameras, each with 2.5-meter resolution. The stereoscopic imaging 

by the two cameras facilitates the construction of three-dimensional terrain maps. 

CARTOSAT–2 was launched in January 2007, and CARTOSAT–2A was launched in 

April 2008; these satellites feature imaging resolution of less than one meter. ISRO has 

also developed its first radar imaging satellites to provide the capability to image day or 

night and through cloud cover; RISAT–2, built with Israeli assistance, was launched in 

April 2009. Although primarily intended for civil applications, these optical and radar 

imaging capabilities will provide militarily useful images and could be made available to 

Indian security and defense forces. 

While India has always explored space science as part of its space program, this has 

definitely been a lower priority than the practical applications of space. Nonetheless, 

India continues to expand its space science activities as part of the overall expansion of 

its space program. This area provides a low-cost opportunity for cooperation with other 

countries to explore space technologies with potential dual-use applications. 

The most exciting developments in space over the last few years have been the new 

initiatives in space exploration announced by the United States, China, the ESA, and 
India. In 2004, the United States adopted a new vision for space exploration in the 

aftermath of the space shuttle Columbia disaster. In 2003, China launched its first 

manned mission into space and announced plans to eventually explore the Moon. 

The Indian lunar mission, Chandrayaan-1, was launched into space on October 22, 2008. 

This was an historic first for India's space program and marked an important milestone in 

their space exploration efforts. Chandrayaan-1 provides high-resolution scientific data in 

the visible, near-infrared, X-ray, and low-energy gamma-ray spectrum that is being used 

in mapping the constituent materials and potential resources on the Moon and could later 

be helpful for planning human lunar exploration. The Indians had invited international 

participation on the Chandrayaan-1 mission and had signed agreements with NASA and 

ESA to participate by providing scientific payloads on the spacecraft. India has a longterm interest in pursuing lunar exploration and is eager to pursue international 

cooperation in this field of endeavor. 

Oddly, despite establishment of a joint working group on civil space cooperation and 

other efforts to improve U.S.-India space cooperation, the United States has not taken the 

initiative to specifically include India in human spaceflight partnership, neither on the 

International Space Station nor in human missions to the Moon. Understandably, ISRO 

has obtained a commitment of assistance from the Russian space agency Roskosmos in 

developing an indigenously built Indian space capsule.21

While the focus of the Indian space program is providing benefit to its people, India also 

intends to use it for foreign policy purposes. This explicitly includes participation in 

commercial and civil space. India is anxious to commercialize its launch capability, 

already completing an agreement to launch an Israeli reconnaissance satellite. India has 

signed up to participate in the European Union Galileo satellite navigation mission. This 

is in parallel with its efforts to participate with the United States on the Global 

Positioning System. India would seem to be hedging its interests in the area of global 

satellite-based navigation. They are also participating in the Global Earth Observation 

System of Systems, a multinational coalition of over 60 nations established in 2004 to 

share environmental data. This will allow India to leverage its space-based meteorology, 

oceanography, and science sensors in order to participate in an international technological 

forum. 

India is also establishing an avenue for cooperative engagement with their regional rival, 

China, in space activities. In November 2006, Chinese president Hu Jintao visited New 

Delhi. This visit included the signing of an agreement with Prime Minister Manmohan 

Singh endorsing their intent to pursue cooperative activities in space for peaceful 

purposes. 

While India has long viewed space capability as a strictly civil function, it is gradually 

including spacepower more and more in its security and military affairs. "India has 

established an Integrated Space Cell jointly operated by the three armed forces and the 

Indian Space Research Organization (ISRO) to protect India's satellites and enhance their 

capability for both military and civilian use." 22 This expansion into security and military 
space, along with its success in civil space, shows India's patient pursuit of a space 

program has established it as a regional space power well on the way to global influence. 

Pakistan. Pakistan has pursued its space activities since 1962 with modest success 

compared to its regional rival, India. The Space and Upper Atmosphere Research 

Commission (SUPARCO) manages Pakistan's space activities. SUPARCO launched their 

first suborbital missions of the Rehbar space experiments in 1962. Pakistan's first 

satellite, Badr A, an experimental communications satellite, was launched into space 

from a Chinese launch site in 1990. The second satellite, Badr-B, was not launched until 

a decade later in 2001 from a launch site in Kazakhstan with the assistance of Russia. 

Pakistan is undertaking its latest efforts in space through partnership with China.23 This 

new agreement on Pakistan-China bilateral cooperation in the space industry could span a 

broad spectrum, including climate science, clean energy technologies, clean water 

technologies, cybersecurity, basic space, atmospheric, and Earth sciences, and marine 

sciences. This latest agreement is an expansion of a 2006 accord for China to launch three 

Pakistani Earth resource survey satellites. 

The Sino-Pakistani cooperation is a logical consequence of several factors. Pakistan seeks 

to maintain its position regarding India by modernizing its remote sensing and 

communications through space capabilities. Pakistan also finds itself with limited access 

to space capabilities driven by U.S. space and missile technology export controls that are 

supported by U.S. allies and signatories of the Missile Technology Control Regime. 

China finds the partnership with Pakistan helpful in maintaining a balance of power with 

India in the region. 

The Middle East and Africa 

The Middle East is a troubled region, with ongoing strife between Israel and the Arab 

nations, the growing influence of radical Islam, the predicament in Iraq, and the growing 

rise of the region's superpower, Iran. Africa is struggling to develop with very little 

industry and infrastructure. Governments in this region naturally leverage space services 

as the quickest way to establish communications infrastructure to support commerce, 

education, and resource monitoring. Satellite communications are especially critical and 

are in robust demand. 24 But reconnaissance satellites are increasingly becoming a hot 

commodity in the ongoing effort by all players to obtain strategic and tactical 

intelligence. 

Israel. "Israel has a technologically advanced market economy with substantial, though 

diminishing, government participation."25Its advanced technology is critical to its national 

security and also one of the key elements in its export portfolio. Security in the region has 

always been of paramount importance, and thus the Israelis focus their space program on 

national security. They have two primary applications: the use of space as a force 

multiplier via communications; and the use of reconnaissance satellites for situational 

awareness of any massing of forces by adversaries and for up-to-date assessment of 

military operations. 
The rise of Iran's space launch capability, and the pursuit of commercially provided 

remote sensing systems by regional neighbors, causes Israel concern about maintaining 

an advantage in the balance of power. Similarly, spacepower is increasingly a part of its 

economic strategy, as it attempts to develop a self-sustaining economy less reliant on 

foreign aid. 

The Israeli Space Agency was established in 1983. Its budget of approximately US $80 

million is only part of the total Israeli spending on space. National security space 

programs are managed through Israel's Directorate of Defense Research and 

Development within its ministry of defense. Some authorities estimate Israel's total 

spending on space at between US $200 million and $300 million. Another important 

organization in the Israeli space program is the Israeli Air Force. The leadership ranks of 

Israel's aerospace efforts, including industry, involve a significant number of retired 

military general officers and admirals. This involves a fairly collegial cohort with its 

members rotating between positions in government, industry, and academia. This is 

epitomized by the illustrious career of astronaut Air Force Colonel Ilan Ramon, who died 

tragically in the space shuttle Columbia accident in 2003. Israel now holds an annual Ilan 

Ramon Conference on Space to honor his service and to inspire Israeli youth.26

Israel has launched 11 satellites in the past 20 years, beginning with the Ofek series in 

1988. Despite its modest budget, Israel developed its own space launch capability early 

on, albeit for very small space missions. The Shavit launcher was used on the initial 1988 

space mission to launch the Ofek satellite into orbit. Interestingly, in order to avoid 

launching over neighboring countries to the east, the Shavit booster takes a westward 

trajectory to attain orbit. This launching against the rotation of the Earth incurs a 30 

percent penalty in mass to orbit capability, but does provide Israel with indigenous launch 

capability of up to 300 kilograms to low Earth orbit without the sensitivity of launching 

over neighboring states. 

The Ofek series of reconnaissance satellites has grown in size to about 200 to 300 

kilograms in mass with primary optics of about 30 centimeters, which provides 

approximately 1-meter ground resolution. Israel has made strides in leveraging 

technology to get higher performance out of small satellites. It is developing a follow-on 

series of reconnaissance satellites, the OPSat series, with larger apertures and 

correspondingly better image resolution. Plans include a constellation of minisatellites

with increasingly sophisticated electro-optical and radar payloads. 27

Israel first launched an imaging radar satellite, the TecSAR series, to provide critical daynight, all-weather imagery, in January 2008. The TecSAR series, significantly larger than 

the optical satellites of the Ofek series, could not be launched into orbit by the Shavit 

rocket. To do so, Israel contracted the launch services of the Indian government's Polar 

Space Launch Vehicle. Thus, Israel and India have begun to cooperate on space, at this 

point through commercial launch services, but the full extent of their cooperative 

activities may not have been publicly revealed. Israel has similarly built a series of 

communications satellites, the Amos series, being placed into geosynchronous orbit by 

foreign launch service providers.
Israel has begun launching Earth observation satellites, the EROS system, with 50-

centimeter apertures and multispectral capability. This has value for national security and 

land-use surveys, along with being a viable commercial product. It has also announced a 

partnership with Northrop Grumman to explore sales of their TecSAR imaging radar 

satellite in the United States. Likewise, Israel has worked closely with the French on a 

joint project for a hyperspectral electro-optical satellite, the Vegetation and Environment 

Monitoring New Micro-Satellite. 

Israel tries to leverage commercial sales of its aerospace, electronic, and optical 

technologies and systems to underwrite its support of national security efforts, somewhat 

the opposite model of the United States. To compensate for the relatively small amount 

of funding available for their space program, the Israelis have focused on small, low-cost 

space systems that deliver adequate capability for their needs. Israel has become rather 

expert at small, lightweight optical imaging systems for satellite missions. It has worked 

with European nations such as France to increase its access to technology. With the 

United States, the Israelis view the Operationally Responsive Space effort as 

complementary to their efforts in small satellites. Additionally, with the increasing 

potential of an adversary to block or interfere with their access to space and operation of 

space systems, they appreciate the value of having rapid launch and deployment 

capabilities. Thus, Israel is exploring options for airborne launch systems. 

Israel is also working hard to develop second-tier suppliers for all of its critical space 

technologies. It appreciates a healthy, indigenous industrial base, especially with the 

potential threat of embargos on technology transfer to Israel, and is working hard to 

establish sustainable technology skills and suppliers. 

With respect to the United States, the Israelis enjoyed the prestige garnered by having an 

astronaut be part of the International Space Station and are looking forward to continue 

this high-level association. 

Israel is looking to export its expertise in exchange for international good will. One in 

particular is through a contract with the Mexican Ministry of Education to provide 4,400 

very small aperture terminals. This will provide wide-band Internet access to 7,700 

classrooms using Gilat's Sky Edge network technology. They will be undergoing a 

similar project in Colombia, teaming with Axesat of Bogata for a 1,500-site SkyEdge 2 

broadband service provider. 

Israel is using its regional spacepower to meet its immediate security needs and also to 

generate commercial sales to subsidize its high-tech sector. It works flexibly with other 

emerging regional space powers such as India to scale up its space systems in affordable 

ways, and it works with emerging spacepower users for commercial sales and good will. 

Israel continues to pursue participation on the U.S. human spaceflight for the prestige 

necessary to inspire its younger generation. 

Iran. In the midst of turmoil in Iraq, Afghanistan, and the nearby Middle East, Iran finds 

itself a regional superpower, but one lacking many modern, high-technology capabilities 
useful in carrying out this role. Iran is pursuing steps to rectify this through establishment 

of an embryonic technology sector, pursuit of nuclear power, and pursuit of missile and 

space technology. With Israel now in possession of its own reconnaissance satellites, the 

Iranian space program could be considered a response to the Israeli space program. Iran's 

Sina-1 imaging satellite was launched by the Russians at the Plesetsk facility in October 

2005. The satellite can take images with a resolution of about 50 meters—useful only for 

land-use surveys—but Iran has plans for more capable satellites in the future. In February 

2009, Iran announced the launch of its second satellite, its first domestically built 

satellite, launched on its own Safir-2 launcher.28

Iran has also begun a suborbital space research program using the Kavosh-2 sounding 

rockets. Like all missile technology, space launch and suborbital launch systems help 

develop the technology for ballistic missiles, and some critics warn that the Iranian 

government is pursuing such technologies. This is a likely situation, and one that has 

been previously repeated by spacefaring countries around the world. The technology to 

do so is well known, and thus is not the limiting factor if Iran chooses to continue 

developing ballistic missile capability. It only takes the political will and adequate 

funding to develop operational systems. 

Despite possible concern with Israeli activity, however, the Iranians have a more strategic 

purpose in mind: 

In January [2005], Iran signed a $132 million deal with a Russian firm to 

build and launch a telecommunications satellite called Zohreh, or Venus. 

Its launch is planned within the next two years. That satellite will facilitate 

communications in remote parts of Iran, increase the number of land and 

mobile telephone lines, boost Internet service and improve radio and 

television coverage.29

Having control of its own space telecommunications capability gives the Iranian 

government control of critical communications and messaging. Iran has also been 

accused of participating in the jamming of communications satellites broadcasting in 

their region that were beaming programming made by Iranian expatriates in southern 

California. The Telstar-12 satellite broadcasting the programs was being jammed by a 

transmitter in Cuba, which turned out to be located at the Iranian embassy there. 

Diplomatic efforts were effective in disarming this Iranian counter-space weapon. 

Nonetheless, Iran is quite aware of the value of spacepower, is intent on developing its 

own, and has already taken steps to counter the spacepower it deems to be undermining 

its domestic stability. 

Saudi Arabia. Saudi Arabia does not yet have indigenous space manufacturing capability 

but has been procuring satellite communications systems from other space powers. The 

Saudis currently have three orbital slots in the geosynchronous belt that provide them 

with the most advantageous position in this region of rapidly growing subscribers.30 The 

ArabSat series continues its successful growth. Saudi Arabia is also an important voice 

among its neighboring states, such as the United Arab Emirates, which is also 
considering the purchase of a commercial-quality reconnaissance satellite. As other Arab 

states begin to emerge as space users and operators, partnerships with Saudi Arabia will 

likely increase in number. 

Turkey. Turkey has very little indigenous space capability. Its strategy is to develop 

capability in space applications while procuring systems and services on the commercial 

market. Although the debate within the European Union continues about whether Turkey 

is in Europe, Turkey undeniably has an affinity for European technology and space 

industry.31

Turkey has been a user of satellite communications and more recently has added to its 

satellite remote sensing and imagery to support its security and economic needs. The U.S. 

company GeoEye announced a deal with the Turkish company INTA Spaceturk, which 

has the exclusive rights to sell IKONOS and GeoEye-1 imagery in Turkey, Georgia, and 

Azerbaijan, and has been GeoEye's partner and regional affiliate since 2001. INTA 

signed an agreement in February 2009 to become an authorized reseller of IKONOS and 

GeoEye-1 imagery and products. 

Turkey is also making efforts to develop and procure indigenously controlled space 

assets. The Ministry of Defense is working closely with indigenous industry partners, the 

Turkish Aerospace Industries (TAI) and the International Satellite and Cable Operator. 

On December 19, 2008, a Franco-Italian team was selected to provide Turkey with a 

turnkey reconnaissance satellite and ground system. 32 The electro-optical imaging 

satellite system, named Gokturk, will be operated by Turkey and will provide sub-meter 

resolution black and white images with 3-meter-resolution multispectral images. The 

contract, valued at 250 million euros, includes the construction of satellite fabrication 

facilities for TAI in Ankara to further efforts to establish an indigenous satellite 

manufacturing capability. 

Nigeria. Nigeria, being near the Middle East and supported by petroleum wealth, is 

making efforts to establish a modern high-technology commercial sector and finds space 

capabilities a worthwhile and necessary foothold to be made. Nigeria cooperated with 

Surrey Satellite Technologies to develop and fly its first microsatellite in space, the 

NigeriaSat-1, launched in September 2003. Similarly, Nigeria worked with China to 

develop its first communications satellite, NigComSat-1, that was launched by a Long 

March 3B from Xichang Launch Center in China in May 2007. 

Algeria . Algeria is also eager to leverage space programs as a means to jumpstart a hightechnology sector. It is working with the French on a collaborative microsatellite effort.33

Algerian aerospace engineers relocated to France to work with EADS Astrium on the 

production of two small but 2.5-meter-resolution Earth remote sensing satellites. Called 

Alsat-2, the satellite will use the French Myriade microsatellites design. Along with 

procuring the Alsat-2 satellites for the Algerian National Space Technology Centre, the 

Algerian aerospace engineers will return home to apply their newly acquired experienced 

to Algeria's indigenous aerospace efforts. This is similar to several contracts for 

commercial sales by the French aerospace firm, EADS Astrium, to emerging space 
powers such as South Korea, Malaysia, and South Korea. The French, in the meantime, 

also gain the good will of investing in the economic development of their former colony, 

helping to ease longstanding resentments. 

Google Earth: The Globalization of Cyber-Space-Power 

One of the biggest applications of space capability is the collection and dissemination of 

information. This makes for a natural fit with the information technology sector and 

innovative companies such as Google, Microsoft, Yahoo, Cisco, and others. Combine 

with this the growing number of entrepreneurial space efforts such as SpaceX, Bigelow 

Aerospace, Virgin Galactic, and others, and what emerges is the synergistic effect of the 

globalization of cyber-space-power, where the neologism conveys the meaning of 

affordable information collected from space being rapidly disseminated around the globe 

to anyone with a credit card. 

Google has launched its Google Earth project to make a wide variety of imagery, 

including satellite imagery, available to the public. This has led to more specific 

cooperative agreements with the United Nations and NASA. The recent partnership 

between Google Earth and the United Nations Environmental Program (UNEP) has 

established an environmental monitoring program for UNEP overlays. This project will 

provide an online reservoir of remote sensing data on more than 100 environmental 

hotspots that UNEP has identified. Similarly, Google and NASA signed an agreement in 

2006 to collaborate in making NASA science and exploration data, including scientific 

data, images, and video, available to researchers and the general public. 

The Google-GeoEye partnership was announced in August 2008. "The combination of 

GeoEye's high-resolution, map-accurate satellite imagery from GeoEye-1 and Google's 

search and display capabilities provides users with access to rich, interactive visual image 

maps of the Earth."" 34 Google already uses imagery collected by another high-resolution 

GeoEye satellite, IKONOS, as well as imagery from other sources, including GeoEye's 

main rival, DigitalGlobe. In 2007, DigitalGlobe launched WorldView-1, a highresolution satellite built by Ball Aerospace that offers half-meter resolution and can 

collect up to 750,000 square kilometers of imagery each day. 

Cisco has teamed up with NASA Ames via a Space Act Agreement to cover the earth 

with a cyberskin to monitor the global climate. 35 Cisco itself is only providing the 

architecture and internet router technology to manage and disseminate data from a wide 

variety of data collected from land, sea, and air by NASA and other organizations. Such a 

capability would be useful eventually to monitor greenhouse gas emissions under any 

cap-and-trade system that might be put into place. 

One additional impact likely to result from the merging of cyberspace and spacepower 

will be that increased accessibility to space-collected information will create even more 

demand for space collection of information. Government leaders, analysts and the general 

public will expect to have access to the latest information and images related to national 
and international security and emergency events, and will not be satisfied with excuses 

that huge financial investments and years of planning would be needed.36

Opportunities for Space Cooperation 

Guiding Principles 

In the early years of spacepower, dominated by the Cold War balance of power and 

strategic nuclear weapons, spacepower was wielded mainly as a weapon. But 50 years 

later, space systems are predominantly civil, commercial, and dual-use, with only a few 

systems dedicated to security applications. In today's world, spacepower is best obtained 

by skillfully balancing security, civil, and commercial space and using it liberally in the 

sphere of foreign policy: 

Is there a way to share the benefits of these strategically and tactically 

important capabilities in a manner that enhances the peace, justice and 

security of all stakeholders? Many nations around the world are answering 

"yes" to this question as they enter into agreements on cooperative space 

projects for the commercial, environmental and military security. More 

and more they are using their space programs to realign the old balance of 

power and create new common interests.37

At a conference in Bangalore in June of 2004, Lee Morin of the U.S. Department of State 

emphasized, "The extent of space cooperation currently taking place between India and 

the United States is quite modest compared to the enormous potential." 38 It is indeed time 

the United States pursued this greater potential with India and with other emerging space 

powers. 

Civil Space Exploration 

Space exploration has always been enormously popular and remains so today. It is a 

magnet to attract less developed space powers into a cooperative agreement. This great 

interest creates an opportunity to establish mutually beneficial agreements that advance 

political, economic, and cultural interests. Once cooperation in civil space is ongoing, it 

becomes easier to consider expanding into security cooperation. 

The U.S. space exploration program is enormously attractive to all the emerging space 

powers. The United States is in discussion with the traditional global space powers, part 

of the ongoing legacy of cooperation on the International Space Station, but has made 

little effort on expanding this to the emerging space powers. These initial activities are

just a start. Israel and Brazil have both had astronauts participate with NASA's human 

spaceflight program. NASA has established an International Lunar Network, an open 

framework of robotic lunar science missions that allows any interested nation to 

contribute a node to their system.39 With very few security issues involved, civil space is 

an ideal area to begin cooperative engagement.40
Space Cooperation Possibilities for Security and Defense 

The major security concerns today are nonproliferation, counterterrorism, and stability 

operations. This is a broad spectrum of security operations not limited to armed conflict. 

Spacepower provides significant enhancement to military and security operations for the 

United States and other spacefaring nations, including arms control treaty monitoring. In 

the case of the 2004 U.S.–India accord, that the strategic partnership identified civil space 

on one hand and nonproliferation and security on the other hand, it is natural to consider 

the possibilities for pursuing cooperative efforts in space for defense and security 

purposes. This is fairly representative of how space is often left out of the top-level 

strategic thinking. This is attributable to the overly classified and controlled nature of 

space capabilities in the United States—they are kept hidden as special security tools and 

not shared as important tools of national interest. 

Specifically, the Defense Framework identifies the following objectives: collaborate on 

multinational operations, promote security and defeat terrorism, promote regional peace 

and security, combat the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction, expand 

collaboration on missile defense, support disaster response, support combined operations, 

support peacekeeping operations, and pursue an increased exchange of intelligence. 

While these objectives are seemingly straightforward, they will have to be carefully 

constructed in the context of relations with China, Pakistan, and other powers in the 

region in order to enhance security and prevent unintended consequences. 

In these global security challenges, coalition operations, such as in Iraq and Afghanistan, 

are now the standard approach necessitated by the geopolitical ramifications of any 

desired endstate. The difficulties that arise in coalition security operations have led one 

military planner to argue for Coalition Operational Responsive Space (C–ORS).41 The 

responsive space paradigm was developed over the past decade specifically to advocate 

for simpler, more affordable space solutions that were more responsive to national 

decisionmakers across a broad spectrum of national security and national interest 

scenarios.42 C–ORS specifically addresses the need to implement space solutions 

constructed as a multinational architecture that is interoperable and extensible by diverse 

coalition members. As more space powers emerge with indigenous capabilities and 

procured systems and services, it should easier to undertake C–ORS approaches. More 

importantly, as more space powers emerge, it will be more necessary to do so to fully 

integrate coalition operations. 

Opportunities in Satellite Communications 

The global satellite telecommunications is very mature with government consortia, 

public-private partnerships, and commercial companies doing a thriving business, with 

many of the players trying to carve out shares in foreign markets.43 There are clear 

opportunities for the United States and its allies to cooperate in satellite communications. 

Both have an interest in providing strategic messages to populations and communications 

to forces in the broad land masses of the Gulf, North Africa, Central Asia, and the Indian 
subcontinent. What is important is that common communications protocols and receiver 

equipment be fielded so that the capabilities can be used efficiently. 

Opportunities in Earth/Ocean Remote Sensing 

An important factor in international security is transparency. The nuclear weapons arms 

control treaties in effect today rely on the ability of signatory nations to verify 

compliance. Remote satellite imagery has been an important tool for verification and for 

monitoring impending aggressive actions. The ability of the United States and many of 

the emerging space powers to share reconnaissance and surveillance data could provide 

increased capability and build common interest. Going even further, an international 

reconnaissance system that provides data that is of commercial quality yet of sufficient 

acuity for verification of security agreements could be operated over central and southern 

Asia and shared by all cooperating nations in the region. These same reconnaissance 

systems could be used to support disaster relief operations. 

Two important example of this are the Global Earth Observation System of Systems 

(GEOSS) global coalition and NASA's SERVIR regional coalitions. GEOSS is a 

partnership of over 70 nations contributing Earth observation data from land, sea, air, and 

space. "The aim is to provide the right information, in the right format, to the right 

people, at the right time, to make the right decisions." 44 GEOSS is the right framework, 

but it is not clear how active and effective the cooperation is. On a much smaller scale, 

but one that is vibrant and readily extensible, is NASA's SERVIR program, which 

"integrates satellite observations, ground-based data, and forecast models to monitor and 

forecast environmental changes and to improve response to natural disasters." 45

Originally established in Central America, the program has been so successful that a 

second project was established in Africa. 

In the future, with global warming and climate change becoming such important issues, it 

may be necessary for the United States to formally establish a climate change emissions 

monitoring system. If treaties are agreed to by the nations of the world, then verifiability 

becomes of utmost importance. This might be done in a manner similar to how nuclear 

treaty monitoring capability was established early in the Cold War, with space remote 

sensing capabilities playing an important role. 

Opportunities in Space Traffic Control 

The recent collision in space of a commercial Iridium satellite and a defunct Russian 

Cosmos satellite, with its ensuing space debris field, has highlighted the need to address 

the increasingly crowded outer space. While many in the United States and the 

international community have argued for more sharing of data on the location of objects 

in space, it has long been delayed due to concerns about revealing information on critical 

and classified national security assets. Space situational awareness has a legacy from the 

Cold War of being critical to all sides in gaining an intelligence advantage. The IridiumCosmos collision in February 2009, along with the growing presence of human 

spaceflight with the International Space Station, the Chinese spaceflight program, and 
private spaceflight by the commercial sector, argues for the need to spin off a public 

space traffic control function distinct from the more sensitive space surveillance 

capabilities. 

The U.S. Air Force Space Command has begun a pilot project called the Commercial and 

Foreign Entities (CFE) initiative. 46 Its transition to U.S. Strategic Command is planned 

for later in 2009, to begin operational support on space collision hazards to commercial 

and foreign space users. Uncertainties remain, however, on what level of liability might 

remain for the U.S. Government while it will be acting essentially in a good Samaritan 

role. The expansion of a space traffic control network is greatly facilitated by the number 

of contributors, and the space object data collection systems are relatively inexpensive, 

thus allowing many emerging space programs to join in a participatory manner. 

Opportunities in Science and Technology 

Science and technology used to be the one area where international cooperation was 

easily done. In this era of ever-increasing technology export control, it is becoming 

harder and harder to do so. Nonetheless, the United States should avidly pursue 

cooperation with emerging space powers and space information users in space science 

and technology. Cooperation in science and technology costs less than in operational 

systems, builds common interest between the technical communities, and provides insight 

into the aims and objectives of the partner's space program. Most importantly, the 

benefits flow both ways: U.S. experts will gain significantly from the collaboration with 

their international peers. 

Conclusion 

The common theme in all these emerging spacepower efforts is to pursue space and 

space-related technologies and capabilities that are practical and affordable. While 

ballistic missiles and missile defense systems are weapons intended to be used only in 

extremis, spacepower is exercised all the time in support of national and international 

security needs. A major consideration for these foreign space efforts is developing 

systems with dual-use capability, providing commercial, civil, and security benefits. 

Another important trend to observe is that foreign nations earnestly pursue international 

cooperation and influence through the use of their space programs. These approaches are 

very responsive to the security needs of the nations involved. While spacepower might 

provide an irresponsible government with additional military capability, for the most part, 

the rise of foreign spacepower can be allied with U.S. efforts to ensure international 

security. 

The new and emerging space powers will test the bounds of current spacepower practice 

and may in the end reconstitute a more vibrant, more interesting milieu of opportunities 

and challenges in space than previously existed among the former small club of global 

space powers. The right spacepower leadership will find a host of followers to advance 

its national and international interests. Without such leadership, the dominant space 

powers may find their advantage squandered.47
Notes

1. Philip Bobbitt, The Shield of Achilles: War, Peace, and the Course of History (New York: Alfred 

A. Knopf, Random House, 2002). Bobbitt analyzes the interrelationship of war and constitutional 

law throughout history and finds that new forms of constituting sovereign government arise after 

epochal wars often lasting many decades. He points out that after the long wars of the 20th century 

(World War I, World War II, and the Cold War), the nations of the world are reconstituting 

themselves as new "market-states." 

2. Some Members of Congress have asserted in public hearings that selling spacecraft components to 

foreign countries that may in turn transfer them to China is the moral equivalent of European and 

American industry selling material to Nazi Germany prior to the Second World War. The details 

of the Congressional hearing where this topic was discussed are available at 

<http://science.house.gov/publications/hearings_markups_details.aspx?NewsID=2360>. Others 

have equated the selling of space technology that may one day be used against the United States 

with profiteering by munitions manufacturers during the First World War. These positions are 

fallacious in that they argue the extreme. By this logic, buying goods at Wal-Mart that are 

manufactured in China is morally reprehensible and should similarly be outlawed as the profits are 

used by the Chinese government for military spending. 

3. National Research Council Committee on Science, Security, and Prosperity in a Changing World, 

"Beyond 'Fortress America': National Security Controls on Science and Technology in a 

Globalized World," National Research Council, 2009. U.S. technology export control regimes 

have a long and storied history. Especially unfortunate for space technologies, in 1999 U.S. law 

placed all space technologies on the controlled munitions list, and thus under strict controls. While 

this certainly slowed the transfer of U.S. space technologies to countries such as China, Iran, and 

North Korea, it did not stop the transfer of space technology from other nations. In fact, other 

nations were catalyzed to develop their own technology to replace the U.S. technology on which 

they formerly relied but that was now cumbersome to obtain. There is a growing chorus of voices 

across the U.S. political spectrum calling for a drastic reform of technology export control, but as 

of yet there is no champion with enough political power or will to challenge the small but 

powerful national security cult that now dominates U.S. international policy. The "Beyond 

'Fortress America'" report is a useful guide to the history and dynamics of U.S. technology export 

controls. The authors' assessment of the effect of this policy is stated in the opening sentence of 

the report: "The export controls and visa regulations that were crafted to meet conditions the 

United States faced over five decades ago now quietly undermine our national security and our 

national economic well-being." 

4. Turner Brinton, "Gen. Chilton: Export Controls Pose Threat to National Security," Space News, 

March 23, 2009, 20. In a written submission to a Congressional committee, General Chilton 

testified, "I remain concerned that our own civil and commercial space enterprise, which is 

essential to the military space industrial base, may be unnecessarily constrained by export control 

legislation and regulation." General Chilton's full testimony is available at 

<http://armedservices.house.gov/pdfs/SF031709/Chilton_Testimony031709.pdf>. 

5. Eric S. Raymond, The Cathedral and the Bazaar: Musings on Linux and Open Source by an 

Accidental Revolutionary (Sebastopal, CA: O'Reilly Media, 1999). The book documents how the 

open-source software movement became the dominant force in the emergence of the Internet and 

web infrastructure, economy, and culture much more so than the large established software 

"cathedrals" of established computing and software corporations. While recognizing that both the 

cathedral and the bazaar cultures made contributions, most planning and prognosticating overlook 

the significant and sometimes disruptive innovations that will emerge from the bazaar. In this 

work on spacepower, the author similarly argues that in fact the more significant changes in the 

spacepower landscape will arise from the teaming interactions of emerging space powers and 

established space powers other than the United States. 
6. John M. Diamond, ed., The Space Report 2009 (Colorado Springs: The Space Foundation, 2009), 

23. 

7. Private communication with Wade L. Huntley regarding the presentation of this author's viewpoint 

at the Center for Space and Defense Studies Forum panel session, Colorado Springs, CO, January 

12, 2007. Huntley pointed out that many influential strategic theorists arose in nations and states 

during disadvantaged times, that is, when they were not the dominant power. 

8. Report of the Commission to Assess United States National Security Space Management and 

Organization , Pursuant to Public Law 106–65, January 11, 2001, accessed on the Internet at 

<www.dod.mil/pubs/space20010111.html>. This report is often referred to as the Space 

Commission Report. 

9. Wade Huntley, "Perspectives on Small and Emerging Space Powers," remarks given at the Center 

for Space and Defense Studies Forum panel session, Colorado Springs, CO, January 12, 2007. 

10. Press release, "MDA delivers RapidEye information solution," MDA corporate Web site, accessed 

at <www.sm.mdacorporation.com/what_we_do/rapideye.html>. 

11. Embraer Web site, available at <www.embraer.com/english/content/home/>. 

12. "Chinese-Brazilian Satellite Slated to Launch this Fall," Space News, August 6, 2007, 9. 

13. "France to Work with Brazil on Satellite Bus Designs," Space News, January 5, 2009. 

14. Diamond, 112. 

15. Central Intelligence Agency, The World Factbook 2009, available at 

<https://www.cia.gov/library/publications/the-world-factbook/geos/ks.html#Econ >. 

16. Private discussion with Dr. Simon P. Worden. 

17. Embassy of the Republic of Korea, "Korea, U.S. to sign agreement to bolster cooperation in space 

exploration," October 2, 2008, available at <http://dynamickorea.com/news/view_news.php?main=KTD&sub=TCH&uid=200800251780&keyword=>. 

18. Ibid. 

19. Randall R. Correll, "U.S.-India Space Partnership: the Jewel in the Crown," Astropolitics 4 (2006), 

159–177. The author argues that space cooperation provides an ideal tool to advance the 

reinvigorated relationship between the United States and India in the wake of the September 11 

terrorist attacks. 

20. Official EDUSAT India Web site, available at <http://edusatindia.org/ >. 

21. K.S. Jayaraman, "India Plans First Manned Mission with Assistance from Russian Space Agency," 

Space News, February 2, 2009, 11. Former NASA administrator Dr. Michael Griffin recently 

remarked on the significant international cooperation in space projects being pursued by other 

nations and lamented that the United States was letting opportunities slip away. Yet other than the 

development of a Global Space Exploration Strategy document, NASA has shown little effort 

since the announcement of the exploration vision to pursue tangible cooperative efforts with 

foreign space agencies. 

22. Diamond, 113. 

23. Syed Fazl-e-Haider, "China, Pakistan Cooperate in Space," Asia Times Online, April 26, 2007, 

available at <www.atimes.com/atimes/South_Asia/ID26Df01.html>. 

24. Peter B. de Selding, "Satellite Business Booming in the Middle East and North Africa," Space 

News, October 20, 2008, 5. 

25. The World Factbook 2009. 

26. Private discussion with Dr. Simon P. Worden. 

27. Barbara Opall-Rome, "Conference Highlights Untapped Potential of Israeli Space Program," 

Space News, February 2, 2009, 15. 

28. Press release, "Iran puts Omid data-processing satellite into orbit," February 3, 2009, available at 

<www5.irna.ir/En/View/FullStory/?NewsId=335409&IdLanguage=3>. 

29. Ali Akbar Dareini, Yahoo News, November 16, 2005, available at 

<http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20051116/ap_on_re_mi_ea/iran_space>. 

30. "Arabsat to Order Two More Satellites in 2008," Space News, September 15, 2008, 13. 

31. Aside from geographic propinquity, Turkey is a member of the North Atlantic Treaty 

Organization and thus participates routinely in military operations and exercises with European 

and North American military units, which heavily involve space-based communications and 

information. Difficulties with stringent U.S. export controls on space technology naturally 
advances Europe, eager to accumulate foreign commercial sales, as Turkey's primary supplier of 

space systems. 

32. Andi Nativi and Michael A. Taverna, "Turkish Delight: Telespazio to Supply Gokturk 

Surveillance Satellite, US MILSATCOM Capability," Aviation Week and Space Technology, 

January 5, 2009, 31. 

33. Peter B. de Selding, "Algeria Buys Two Small Remote Sensing Satellites—EADS to Train 25 

Algerian Aerospace Engineers," Space News, February 6, 2006. 

34. Andrea Shalal-Esa, "GeoEye signs deal to provide imagery to Google," Reuters, available at 

<www.reuters.com/article/technologyNews/idUSN2837224420080829?sp=true>. 

35. Press release, "NASA, Cisco Partnership on Climate Change Monitoring Platform," March 3, 

2009, available at <http://newsroom.cisco.com/dlls/2009/prod_030309b.html>. 

36. "Congressman Demands Answers from Google," Space News, April 9, 2007, 3. U.S. 

Representative Brad Miller reportedly demanded to know why images on Google Earth did not 

show the city of New Orleans ravaged by Hurricane Katrina in 2005. Google Earth and similar 

Internet-based services do not have an operational mission, and the data, while impressively 

arrayed, is sparse and stale. Yet government officials at local and national levels around the world 

are coming to expect ready access to up-to-date information. 

37. Randall R. Correll, "Military Space Cooperation: Aligning the Balance of Power and Building 

Common Interest," Astropolitics 2, no. 2 (2004), 133–147. 

38. Lee Morin, "Space Cooperation: Expanding Human Frontiers, Enhancing Development, 

Strengthening Relations," prepared remarks for the India-United States Conference on Space 

Science, Applications, and Commerce—Strengthening and Expanding Cooperation, Bangalore, 

India, June 21–25, 2004. 

39. See NASA's official Web site for details on the International Lunar Network program, available at 

<http://nasascience.nasa.gov/missions/iln>. 

40. Randall R. Correll and Nicolas Peter, "Odyssey: Principles for Enduring Space Exploration," 

Space Policy 21 (2005), 251–258. 

41. Colin Clark, "U.S. Official Cites Need for International Coalition on ORS," Space News, May 28, 

2007, 14; Tom Doyne, "Coalition Operationally Responsive Space: A 100 Satellite Solution," 

presentation to the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, October 2007. 

42. Simon P. Worden and Randall R. Correll, "Responsive Space and Strategic Information," Defense 

Horizons 40 (Washington, DC: National Defense University Press, April 2004). 

43. Peter B. de Selding, "More European Satcomm Companies Looking to Crack U.S. Defense 

Market," Space News, January 26, 2009, 13. 

44. See a description of GEOSS at the National Oceanographic and Atmospheric Agency's Web site, 

available at <www.noaa.gov/eos.html>. 

45. See the SERVIR project Web site at <http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/servir/index.html> for 

more information. 

46. Michael A. Taverna, "Traffic Cop," Aviation Week and Space Technology, April 20, 2009. 

47. Randall R. Correll and Simon P. Worden, "The Demise of U.S. Spacepower: Not with a Bang but 

a Whimper," Astropolitics 3, no. 3 (December 2005), 233–264. The authors argue that staggering 

cost growth and schedule delays in U.S. space programs are causing national leadership to 

consider divesting from spacepower in pursuit of other solutions—an ill-advised course of action, 

but understandably tempting in the face of poor performance by the U.S. military-industrial 

aerospace complex. A better solution would be to install more competent leadership who could 

deliver cost-effective spacepower, just as many emerging space actors are doing. 
Chapter 27:

Emerging Domestic Structures: Organizing the Presidency for Spacepower

John M. Logsdon

Organizational arrangements are not neutral. Organization is one way of expressing 

national commitment, influencing program direction, and ordering priorities. 

—Harold Seidman1 

This chapter addresses a single, rather straightforward question: Is there a best 

organizational structure or approach at the Presidential level if the United States wants to 

maximize the contributions of its civilian, military, intelligence, and commercial space 

capabilities to the pursuit of its national goals and purposes? 

Developing a sound and comprehensive theory of spacepower is a necessary but 

insufficient condition for ensuring the full contribution of space capabilities and activities 

to furthering national interests. To be meaningful, such a theory must be used as a 

foundation for a spacepower strategy, and it may be that such a strategy cannot be 

successfully implemented unless that implementation is managed, or at least carefully 

overseen, by some sort of organizational structure at the national level. There are too 

many separate interests and centrifugal forces at work in the U.S. space sector to expect 

an automatic coherence of space actions in pursuit of national objectives; there needs to 

be some means of coordinating the behavior of various separate space actors to be 

consistent with national purposes. As Harold Seidman comments: 

A President is not self-sufficient. The Congress can perform its 

constitutional functions without the executive establishment and the 

bureaucracy. A President cannot. 

It is the agency heads, not the President, who have the men, money, 

material, and legal powers. . . . To work his will . . . the President must 

have at his disposal the trade goods controlled by the agencies and be able 

to enlist the support of their constituencies. 

An alliance—which is what the executive branch really is—is by 

definition a confederation of sovereigns joined together in pursuit of some 

common goal. . . . Individual purposes and goals are subordinated only to 

the extent necessary to hold the alliance intact.2 

The capabilities that form the basis of U.S. spacepower are controlled, not by the 

President, but by executive branch agencies such as the Department of Defense and its 

constituent elements, the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA), the 
National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), and the National 

Reconnaissance Office (NRO). The Department of State relates space capabilities to U.S. 

foreign policy objectives and oversees the implementation of the International Traffic in 

Arms Regulations, which influence space technology exports. The Departments of 

Commerce and Transportation and the Federal Communications Commission also play 

important regulatory roles vis-à-vis the U.S. commercial space sector. That sector 

increasingly is developing with private capital and is operating capabilities that are an 

essential part of U.S. spacepower. Each of these space actors, and subelements within 

them (for example, NASA's Science Mission Directorate), has its own set of relationships 

with supportive nongovernmental constituencies. Bringing these separate organizations 

together in pursuit of common goals is a challenging task. 

A President has limited power to pursue national interests as he defines them in the face 

of this distribution of power with the executive branch. The President can set priorities 

through policy directives and budget decisions and can appoint people who share his 

values and perspectives to head the executive agencies, but almost inevitably those 

individuals find their loyalties divided between White House priorities and their own 

agency's interests, which only occasionally are the same. 

In addition, congressional oversight and funding responsibilities with respect to executive 

branch space activities are diffused over many committees and subcommittees. They 

reflect the decentralized organization of the executive branch, and the dispersion of 

power among congressional committees makes a coherent congressional perspective on 

any particular space issue, much less a comprehensive approach to U.S. spacepower, 

almost impossible to achieve. Relationships between executive agencies and Congress 

may pull agency leaders in directions inconsistent with the President's priorities. 

Congress and the White House are separate institutions sharing power, and the President 

must convince Congress to agree with his priorities for U.S. spacepower capabilities if 

those capabilities are to be maximized. Congress cannot substitute for the President in 

this regard. 

There are also many nongovernmental interests trying to influence the direction taken by 

one or the other element of the government's space agencies. Each actor in the space 

industry, labor unions, representatives of state and regional governments, universities, 

and science and engineering associations, among others, attempts to align the 

government's space activities with its particular interests. 

The U.S. approach to spacepower must also be formulated in a global context, with an 

increasing number of other spacefaring countries pursuing policies that mix competitive 

and cooperative elements. The post–Cold War period during which the United States was 

the unchallenged space superpower is rapidly becoming only a memory, and the United 

States has to craft an approach to advancing its interests, both in space and through the 

use of space capabilities, with high sensitivity to its overall relationships with other 

spacefaring countries and to their differing approaches to the use of their own 

spacepower. 
If there is to be a national strategy for space informed by a comprehensive theory of 

spacepower, it must come from the center of government: "The bureaucracy is no more 

equipped to manufacture grand designs for Government programs than carpenters, 

electricians, and plumbers are to be architects. But if an architect attempted to build a 

house, the results might well be disastrous."3 The White House must act as the "architect" 

for a U.S. space strategy and must persuade the various centers of spacepower within and 

outside the Federal Government that it is in their mutual interest to work together in 

turning that strategy into action. How best to achieve Presidential control over executive 

branch agencies is a classic problem of government organization, and it is basically no 

different in the space sector than in other areas of government activity. 

Recent Organizational Proposals 

Recognizing these realities, the Commission to Assess United States National Security 

Space Management and Organization (the Space Commission) put forth a proposal in 

January 2001 for dealing with space issues at the White House level. The Space 

Commission noted that "the United States has a vital national interest in space. . . . 

[Space] deserves the attention of the national leadership, from the President on down." 

The commission recognized that "only the President can impress upon the members of 

the Cabinet . . . the priority to be placed on the success of the national space program." 

The commission added, "The National Security Council can assist the President with 

measures to monitor the progress of the national space program toward defined goals."4 

The Space Commission made detailed recommendations on how best to organize for 

space within the White House structure, noting that "the present interagency process is 

inadequate to address the number, range, and complexity of today's space issues, which 

are expected to increase over time. A standing interagency coordination process is 

needed." The commission proposed that a Senior Interagency Group (SIG) for Space be 

established within the National Security Council (NSC) structure. In order to develop the 

SIG (Space) agenda and to provide coordination at the working level, the Space 

Commission recognized the need for "dedicated staff support . . . with experience across 

the four space sectors."5 

The role of SIG (Space) would be to oversee the activities of the various executive 

branch space agencies to: 

• leverage the collective investments in the commercial, civil, defense, and 

intelligence sectors to advance U.S. capabilities in each

• advance initiatives in domestic and international fora that preserve and enhance 

U.S. use of and access to space 

• reduce existing impediments to the use of space for national security purposes. 

To achieve these objectives, the SIG "would oversee the implementation of national 

space policy" and "focus on the most critical national security space issues, including 

those that span the civil and commercial sectors."6 
The Space Commission also observed that "the President might find it useful to have 

access to high-level advice in developing a long-term strategy for sustaining the nation's 

role as the leading space-faring nation." Thus, the commission recommended the creation 

of a "Presidential Space Advisory Group" that would be "unconstrained in scope and 

provide recommendations that enable the nation to capitalize on its investment in people, 

technology, infrastructure and capabilities in all space sectors." Such an independent 

group could also "identify new technical opportunities that could advance U.S. interests 

in space."7 

From the perspective of maximizing and making best use of U.S. spacepower, these 

organizational recommendations seem to have been particularly well conceived. But 

when the administration of George W. Bush came to the White House and the chairman 

of the Space Commission, Donald Rumsfeld, became Secretary of Defense, they were not 

implemented, and many of the problems pointed out by the Space Commission persisted 

or even worsened. In 2008, a congressionally mandated "Independent Assessment Panel 

on the Organization and Management of National Security Space"—more frequently 

known as the Allard Commission, after its congressional sponsor, Senator Gordon Allard 

(R–CO), or the Young Committee, after the panel's chair, A. Thomas Young—reached 

similar conclusions to those of the Space Commission. The group recommended that "the 

President should establish and lead the execution of a National Space Strategy" and that 

"to implement the strategy, the President should reestablish the National Space Council, 

chaired by the National Security Adviser, with the authority to assign roles and 

responsibilities, and to adjudicate disputes over requirements and resources."8 

The Executive Office structure for space policy as it existed at the start of the 

administration of President Barack Obama was thus rather different from that 

recommended by either the Space Commission or the Allard Commission. And those 

recommendations with respect to structures at the White House level were only one part 

of both groups' recommendations for reorganizing the management of national security 

space. This chapter will conclude with a discussion of whether there is merit in 

reconsidering these recommendations, if the precepts of a spacepower theory are to be 

put into practice. But first it would be useful to see if there are lessons that can be learned 

from a brief review of White House organization for space over the last half-century. 

Alternative Organization Approaches: A Historical Perspective 

There has been some form of White House (including the Executive Office of the 

President) structure for managing U.S. space efforts since the Eisenhower administration, 

which was faced with the issue of how to organize the U.S. space effort in response to the 

October 1957 Soviet launch of Sputnik. A brief review of the various ways in which 

different Presidents organized their management of U.S. space matters can provide a 

rather comprehensive catalogue of possible organizational alternatives or elements that 

might be employed by future Presidents. 

EisenhowerAdministration 
In the aftermath of the first two Soviet satellite launches, President Dwight D. 

Eisenhower appointed the President of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, James 

Killian, as his advisor on science and technology and gave Killian the responsibility for 

suggesting an organizational approach for space. In December 1957, Killian recognized 

that the Department of Defense was "committed to a space program and is in the process 

of setting one up," but that there was a "broad area of non-military basic research relating 

to space." He noted that there were several alternatives for the conduct of this nonmilitary 

space research, including having it managed through the Department of Defense or 

through an existing or new civilian agency. Whatever approach the President chose, 

suggested Killian, "there should be some mechanism . . . which gives coherence to the 

broad program."9 From the very beginnings of the U.S. space program, the need for a 

central coordinating mechanism was thus recognized. 

Eisenhower at first did not see the need for a new, separate space agency; his initial 

inclination was to keep all U.S. space activities within the Department of Defense. But he 

soon became persuaded that space science and exploration should be under civilian 

control. That decision spread U.S. Government space capabilities between two agencies, 

the Department of Defense and a new National Aeronautics and Space Administration. 

By assigning control over the initial U.S. reconnaissance satellite program Corona to a 

separate mechanism outside of both the Department of Defense and the Central 

Intelligence Agency in February 1958, Eisenhower also laid the foundation for a separate 

intelligence space organization. As he sent his proposals for a civilian space agency to 

Congress in April 1958, Eisenhower did not include a mechanism for coordinating the 

national space effort. 

However, as Congress debated the administration's proposal, both the House of 

Representatives and the Senate came to the view that some such mechanism was 

necessary. The House suggested an Aeronautics and Space Advisory Committee that 

would be comprised of individuals outside the government and would meet only four 

times a year. This position was also favored by Killian. The Senate, under Majority 

Leader Lyndon B. Johnson, favored a high-level policy board along the lines of the NSC 

to exercise centralized policymaking authority for a coordinated national space program 

and to ensure that questions of broad national strategy were considered in formulating 

that program. The Senate position prevailed, and the 1958 Space Act established a nineperson National Aeronautics and Space Council in the Executive Office of the President. 

The council would be chaired by the President and would include as members the 

Secretaries of State and Defense, the administrator of NASA, the chairman of the Atomic 

Energy Commission, one other senior government official, and three private citizens.10 

Although he had agreed to establish the council at Johnson's urging, Eisenhower did not 

fully implement the intent of Congress. Rather, he added a few people to the NSC staff to 

deal with space matters and handled space policy issues through the National Security 

Council process, adding the NASA administrator to those in attendance when space 

issues were to be discussed and declaring such an occasion a meeting of the Space 

Council. By 1960, Eisenhower had concluded that the idea that there could be a 

comprehensive, integrated U.S. space program was incorrect, and thus called for a 
revision of the 1958 Space Act that would eliminate "those provisions which reflect the 

concept of a single program embracing military as well as non-military space activities," 

since "in actual practice, a single civil-military program does not exist and in fact is 

unattainable." Given this conclusion, Eisenhower judged that he did not need a separate 

council for space matters and proposed that it be abolished. 

Both NASA and the House of Representatives supported Eisenhower's proposal, but it 

was blocked in the Senate by Lyndon Johnson, who observed that there would be a 

Presidential election in a few months and that "the next President could well have 

different views as to organization and function of the military and civilian space 

programs." By the time he made this comment on August 31, 1960, Johnson knew that 

John F. Kennedy and not he was the Democratic nominee for the Presidency, but he still 

believed in the strategic importance of space and the need to deal with space issues at the 

national level.11 

A broad 21-page statement of national space policy was developed during the 

Eisenhower administration and issued inside the government (but not made public) as a 

National Aeronautics and Space Council document in January 1960. The statement noted 

that "although the full potentialities and significance remain largely to be explored, it is 

already clear that there are important scientific, civil, military, and political implications 

for the national security."12 This was to be the last Presidentially approved statement on 

national space policy for 18 years. 

Kennedy Administration 

As he prepared to enter the White House after his 1960 election, John F. Kennedy was 

advised that there was a need for policy coordination between the civilian and military 

space programs and that a revitalized National Aeronautics and Space Council, with 

fewer members (none from outside the government) and with the Vice President rather 

than the President as its chair, might be a useful means of achieving such coordination 

with respect to "high priority policy issues."13 Kennedy accepted this advice and 

submitted the legislation needed to amend the 1958 Space Act to create a National 

Aeronautics and Space Council along these lines. 

An opportunity to use the council mechanism arose early in the new administration. In 

the wake of the April 12, 1961, launch of the first human, Soviet cosmonaut Yuri 

Gagarin, into space, President Kennedy asked his Vice President, Lyndon Johnson, "as 

Chairman of the Space Council to be in charge of making an overall survey of where we 

stand in space."14 At this point, the Space Council had only one staff person, a former 

congressional staff member named Edward Welsh. Together, he and Johnson organized 

hurried consultations involving NASA, the Department of Defense, the Atomic Energy 

Commission, NASA official Wernher von Braun, Air Force General Bernard Schriever, 

several businessmen, and senior members of the Senate. Then NASA and Department of 

Defense staff (without Welsh's involvement) prepared a lengthy memorandum titled 

"Recommendations for Our National Space Program: Changes, Policies, and Goals." This 

memorandum was sent to the Vice President on May 8. Johnson endorsed it and 
forwarded it to the President on the same day. The memorandum called for an across-theboard acceleration of the U.S. space effort and increased integration of the civilian and 

military space programs, which Dwight Eisenhower a few months earlier said was 

impossible. It also recommended setting a manned lunar landing as a national goal.15 

The Space Council acquired a small staff of its own in 1961–1962 and was active on 

other space issues, in particular on how best to organize the government for the 

development and operation of communications satellites. The Space Council principals 

met a number of times as a body during the Kennedy administration. However, the 

council never again was the primary source of space policy advice to the President, who 

relied on those with whom he had a personal relationship, such as his science advisor 

Jerome Weisner and his staff, and on NASA Administrator James Webb for counsel on 

space matters. (Webb was never happy to find the Space Council and its staff between 

himself and the President.) Attempts by the Space Council to develop a comprehensive 

statement on national space policy were not successful, and there is no indication that the 

council staff was able to exert any influence on defense and national security space 

issues. 

Johnson Administration 

Lyndon Johnson once remarked that he had spent much more time on space matters as 

Vice President than he did as President. This is not surprising, given that issues such as 

the war in Southeast Asia and the demands of his Great Society programs were highpriority issues during his time in the White House. Vice President Hubert Humphrey, 

who became chairman of the Space Council in 1965, had shown little interest in space 

matters as a member of the Senate, and there is no indication that the council was 

particularly active between 1964 and 1968. Edward Welsh stayed on as executive 

secretary, but the White House depended more on James Webb, its science advisory 

apparatus, and budget director Charles Schultze for space policy advice. Vice President 

Humphrey did try to use the Space Council mechanism to stimulate discussions on how

better to use the space program as an instrument of foreign policy, but with little apparent 

impact. By the end of the Johnson administration, the Space Council was basically a 

moribund structure. Welsh stayed on as executive secretary until Johnson left office in 

January 1969. 

NixonAdministration 

As he assumed office in January 1969, President Richard M. Nixon was advised that, 

with the first landing on the Moon in the near future, there was a need for a 

comprehensive review of the national space program. Nixon asked his Vice President, 

Spiro Agnew, to head up a Space Task Group to carry out such a review. The review did 

not use the formal mechanism of the National Aeronautics and Space Council, which in 

1969 was without a dedicated staff, to carry out this review. Staff support for the Space 

Task Group came instead from the White House Office of Science and Technology. 
In June 1969, toward the end of the Space Task Group review, Apollo 8 astronaut 

William Anders was appointed executive secretary of the Space Council, with a mandate 

to revitalize the organization. Over the next 31⁄2 years, Anders and his small staff were 

active participants in the White House discussions on the content of the post-Apollo 

space program, on a new approach to international cooperation in space, and on whether 

to approve development of the space shuttle. They had little apparent involvement with 

the military or national security space programs. But the Space Council never met at the 

principals level, and its staff was only one of several sources of space policy advice 

within the Executive Office. The Science Advisor and his Office of Science and 

Technology and what in 1970 became the Office of Management and Budget had more 

weight in most White House policy debates. 

As he began his second term in January 1973, Richard Nixon announced that he was 

abolishing the National Aeronautics and Space Council (and the Office of Science and 

Technology). His message to Congress announcing this action said that: 

basic policy issues in the United States space effort have been resolved, 

and the necessary interagency relationships have been established. I have 

therefore concluded, with the Vice President's concurrence, that the 

Council can be discontinued. Needed policy coordination can now be 

achieved through the resources of the executive departments and agencies, 

such as the National Aeronautics and Space Administration, augmented by 

some of the former Council staff.16 

Ford Administration 

During most of the administration of President Gerald R. Ford, there was no Executive 

Office unit with specific responsibilities for space policy. General science and technology 

advice was provided by the director of the National Science Foundation, who was also 

designated as the President's science advisor. In 1976, Congress passed a bill 

reestablishing a White House Office of Science and Technology Policy (OSTP) to 

provide advice to the President on the full range of science and technology policy issues, 

including space. Defining space as a science and technology policy issue, rather than as 

an issue of broad national policy, had the effect of limiting the influence of OSTP on 

non–research and development space matters. 

Carter Administration 

Space policy remained the responsibility of OSTP during the 4 years that Jimmy Carter 

was President. Given the broad purview of OSTP responsibilities and its small staff, only 

one or two staff members worked on space issues. With OSTP leadership, for the first 

time since the end of the Eisenhower administration, a broad statement of national space 

policy was developed. The senior OSTP staff member with space responsibilities was 

dual-hatted as a National Security Council staff member, establishing a pattern of close 

cooperation on space matters between the two organizations that has persisted for most of 

the time since. This arrangement also allowed this staff person access to highly classified 
programs and intelligence information. As the Carter administration began talks on space 

arms control with the Soviet Union in 1978, OSTP was very much involved. 

Reagan Administration 

For the first 18 months of Ronald Reagan's Presidency, OSTP remained the lead White 

House organization for space policy; its staff managed the development of the first 

Reagan statement on national space policy, which was issued on July 4, 1982. That 

policy stated that: 

Normal interagency coordinating mechanisms will be employed to the maximum extent 

possible to implement the policies enunciated in this directive. To provide a forum to all 

Federal agencies for their policy views, to review and advise on proposed changes to 

national space policy, and to provide for orderly and rapid referral of space policy issues 

to the President for decision as necessary, a Senior Interagency Group (SIG) on Space 

shall be established. The SIG (Space) will be chaired by the Assistant to the President for 

National Security Affairs and will include the Deputy or Under Secretary of State, 

Deputy or Under Secretary of Defense, Deputy or Under Secretary of Commerce, 

Director of Central Intelligence, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Director of the 

Arms Control and Disarmament Agency, and the Administrator of the National 

Aeronautics and Space Administration.17 

The National Security Council, using the SIG (Space) mechanism, held the White House 

lead for space policy for the remainder of the Reagan administration and issued a number 

of space policy statements with associated public "fact sheets."18 There was usually only 

one NSC staff member with specific space responsibility who worked closely with one or 

two colleagues from OSTP. 

George H.W. Bush Administration 

The Democratic leadership in Congress was not happy with the shift of space policy 

jurisdiction to the NSC. This meant that space decisions would be made in the secretive 

style characteristic of NSC operations and that Congress could not force the NSC 

director, who was also assistant to the President for national security affairs, to testify at 

congressional hearings, since he was not a Senate-approved Presidential nominee. There 

were several attempts in the 1980s to reestablish a separate space council through 

legislation; doing so would mean that the Senate had to approve the nomination of an 

individual to be Space Council executive secretary and could compel that individual to 

testify before Congress. The White House opposed such a congressional initiative until 

1988, when the measure was incorporated in the NASA fiscal year 1989 authorization 

bill. In its revised form, the Space Council executive secretary was not a Presidential 

nominee requiring Senate confirmation. That bill was signed by the President. 

A new National Space Council came into being on February 1, 1989; it was chaired by 

Vice President J. Danforth Quayle. The law establishing the council was silent on 
membership but did provide for up to six council staff members in addition to an 

executive secretary. 

For the next 4 years, the Space Council staff played an extremely activist role in 

attempting to revitalize what it judged to be a stagnant civilian space program. The staff 

was the primary mover behind what became known as the Space Exploration Initiative, 

announced by President Bush on July 20, 1989. This initiative called for a return to the 

Moon and then human journeys to Mars. In December 1989, the council assembled a blue 

ribbon commission for a 2-day meeting to comment on what was perceived as NASA's 

disappointing response to that initiative, and then convened a synthesis group to examine 

alternative approaches to human space exploration. In 1990, the council staff initiated 

another high-level examination of the civilian space program, chaired by Lockheed 

Martin executive Norm Augustine; this review took place over several months and went 

into great depth. In 1991, council staff convinced the Vice President and the President 

that NASA administrator Richard Truly should be replaced and played a key role in 

selecting his successor, Daniel Goldin. After the collapse of the Soviet Union, the council 

took the lead in outreach to the new Russian government with respect to both commercial 

and government-to-government space cooperation. In mid-1992, the National Space 

Council finally established a 12-person Vice President's Space Policy Advisory Board 

that had been called for in the legislation establishing the council. The board was 

composed of nongovernmental members with long experience in the various sectors of 

U.S. space activity, and it issued three reports on space issues during the second half of 

1992. 

There is no evidence that the council staff played an equally activist role with respect to 

the national security space program, and its interventions into the day-by-day 

management of NASA's efforts were strongly resented by senior NASA officials. The 

Vice President convened occasional meetings of senior executive branch officials 

involved in space matters, and there were several statements of national space policy 

issued under the council's auspices, but the National Space Council was primarily a staffintensive activity rather than a forum for top-level policy discussions. Given the council's 

central role in space policy, neither OSTP nor NSC played a major role with respect to 

space policy during the Bush administration. 

ClintonAdministration 

One of Bill Clinton's campaign promises was to reduce the size of the institutional 

Presidency by 25 percent. As part of this effort, the National Space Council and the Vice 

President's Space Policy Advisory Board were abolished soon after Clinton took office in 

January 1993. Jurisdiction over civil space policy matters was assigned to OSTP as part 

of the portfolio of its associate director for technology, with national security space being 

assigned to the associate OSTP director for national security and international affairs. For 

most of the 8 years of the Clinton administration, there were two or three OSTP staff 

members with specific space policy responsibilities, and for the most part they limited 

their activities to the civilian space sector. The administration also established a National 

Science and Technology Council as the inside-the-government mechanism for policy 
review. That council had several standing committees in various areas of science and 

technology, but none for space. President Clinton in 1993 established the President's 

Council of Advisors on Science and Technology as a source of external advice on science 

and technology; space policy was not among the topics that came before that body during 

the Clinton administration. 

There were a number of space policy statements generated through an interagency 

process coordinated by OSTP, with a new statement of national space policy issued in 

September 1996. Vice President Al Gore and his staff also paid particular attention to 

space issues and had a major role in the decision to invite Russia to join the space station 

program and in several other space initiatives. Staff cooperation between OSTP and NSC 

continued. The National Security Council lead for space matters was its director for

space, who reported to the NSC senior director for defense policy and arms control and 

who worked closely with the OSTP staff on space issues. 

George W. Bush Administration 

At the outset of his administration, President Bush created a number of policy 

coordinating committees (PCCs) that were to be the main day-to-day fora for interagency 

coordination of national security policy, rather than establishing separate senior 

interagency groups for high-priority issues. The PCCs were to provide policy analysis for 

consideration by more senior committees of the NSC system, such as the Deputies 

Committee, the Principals Committee, and the NSC itself, and to ensure timely responses 

to decisions made by the President.19 Space policy was not originally a focus of one of the 

PCCs, but a Space Policy Coordinating Committee, chaired by the National Security 

Council, was soon established and in June 2002 was assigned the responsibility for 

carrying out a comprehensive review of national space policy. 

Members of the Space Policy Coordinating Committee are mid-level political appointees 

(for example, assistant secretaries) of the executive agencies dealing with space matters. 

Staff support is provided by the NSC Director for Space, the Assistant Director for Space 

and Aeronautics of the White House OSTP, and a senior OSTP analyst. These three 

individuals are thus the only people (except for Office of Management and Budget staff) 

with a primary responsibility for space policy in the Executive Office structure. 

A National Defense University review of the work of the PCCs suggests that "PCC 

planning is focused more on advance planning at the political and strategic level. . . . An 

effective interagency process reduces the complexity of the policy decisions and focuses 

the planning on mission success." The review added: "Collaboration is central to a PCC's 

success, but teamwork and unity is [sic] vulnerable to political risks, bureaucratic 

equities, and personal relationships. . . . Policy disagreements and turf battles are 

inevitable because of divergent political philosophies, different departmental objectives 

and priorities, disagreements about the dynamics or implications of developing situations, 

or because departments are seeking to evolve or formulate new roles and missions." In 

addition, "hard problems do not lend themselves to easy solutions, and frequently there 

are genuine differences between departments over the best ways, means, and objectives 
for dealing with a national security problem. . . . As one former NSC staff member 

observed, the easiest outcome to produce in the interagency process is to prevent policy 

from being made." For the PCC process to work, "the wide range of issues, the different 

policy perspectives of various departments, the nature of bureaucratic politics, contests 

over turf and responsibilities, disagreements over which department has the lead, and the 

clash of personalities and egos all place a premium on ensuring that the equities of all 

involved agencies are considered, and on building an informal policy consensus amongst 

the players."20 This recent description of the relationship between the President's 

policymaking apparatus and various executive agencies is strikingly similar to the more 

general observations made by Harold Seidman 38 years ago. 

These general observations also appear to reflect the recent experience in the space policy 

sector. Reportedly, interagency disagreements slowed the progress of the space policy 

review ordered in June 2002 and required multiple drafts of a national space policy 

statement before it could be sent to the President for approval in August 2006. In the 

space sector, "an informal policy consensus" seemingly proved very elusive, and the 

distribution of power between the Executive Office and the disagreeing agencies made it 

almost impossible to force agreement from the White House. 

Lessons Learned 

One clear observation that follows from the above review is that many approaches to 

organizing White House space policy management have been tried in the last halfcentury. Thus, any structure that might emerge in the future is likely to resemble a prior 

structure or include elements of prior structures that had previously been tried. 

A second observation is that a separate White House space policy organization, such as a 

space council, has not been successful in demonstrating its superiority as an 

organizational approach. Although the National Aeronautics and Space Council existed 

from 1958 to 1973, it never became the major, much less the sole, means for developing 

a national approach to what would now be called spacepower. With only a few 

exceptions, other Executive Office organizations, particularly the Office of Science and 

Technology Policy and the National Security Council, not to mention the White House 

budget office, and the heads of the executive branch space agencies were not willing to 

defer to the council as the primary forum for developing space policy options for the 

President. Reestablishing the National Space Council in 1989 was an initiative forced on 

a reluctant White House by Congress. In its 4 years of operation, an activist council staff 

managed to alienate most executive agencies. Its major policy proposal, the Space 

Exploration Initiative, was stillborn; the council did not prove an effective mechanism for 

rallying broad support for a Presidential space initiative or for convincing the NASA 

leadership that the initiative was the proper course of action to follow. One possible 

reason for the space council's lack of influence is that it has been headed during most of 

its history by a Vice President who was not a close ally of the President, who had no 

strong Washington political base of his own, and thus could not call on either the 

President's or his own power to back up the guidance provided by the council and its 
staff. In addition, by operating outside of the National Security Council structure, the 

space council found it very difficult to exert influence on national security space issues. 

On the positive side, the National Space Council between 1989 and 1992 did commission 

two high-level external reviews of space issues and did create a well-qualified external 

Space Policy Advisory Board that was able to produce three insightful reports in a short 

period of time, demonstrating that there could be value in such an advisory body. As a 

Presidential appointee, the executive secretary of the National Space Council could serve 

as a spokesman for the White House on space policy matters. But the Space Council 

mechanism did not demonstrate sufficient value to be maintained in existence as the 

administration changed in 1993. 

Giving the Office of Science and Technology Policy and the National Science and 

Technology Council the lead responsibility in space policy, as was the case during the 

Clinton administration, is likely to have biased the policy debate toward treating space as 

a research and development issue. Approaching space issues from this perspective is not 

likely to fully capture all dimensions of a spacepower approach to national space policy. 

The reality is that the OSTP and NSC staffs have worked closely together, whichever 

parent organization has lead responsibility, but at the more senior levels of 

decisionmaking, OSTP leaders come from different backgrounds than their NSC 

counterparts, and as space issues have worked their way up the OSTP chain of command 

they were viewed differently than if they had been considered issues of broad national 

security policy. 

A persistent problem for White House control over the totality of the Nation's space 

effort has been the diffuse structure and strongly entrenched position of the various 

elements of the national security space sector. It has been extremely difficult for the 

Executive Office staff to penetrate and then influence the inner workings of that sector. 

The 2001 recommendations of the Space Commission and the 2008 recommendations of 

the Allard Commission were intended to provide a more integrated national security 

space sector, more amenable to central management within the Department of Defense 

(and by implication, the White House). 

It seems that only the National Security Council within the White House structure brings 

to bear the requisite perspectives and institutional position to have a reasonable chance to 

be effective in advancing U.S. spacepower and linking it to U.S. scientific, economic, and 

national security interests. As the most recent statement of national space policy notes: 

In this new century, those who effectively utilize space will enjoy added prosperity and 

security and will hold a substantial advantage over those who do not. Freedom of action 

in space is as important to the United States as air power and sea power. In order to 

increase knowledge, discovery, economic prosperity, and to enhance the national 

security, the United States must have robust, effective, and efficient space capabilities.21 

Is the Present Structure Working? 
Saying that in principle the National Security Council is the appropriate venue for 

managing U.S. space activities in ways most likely to maximize the contributions of 

spacepower to broad national objectives does not mean that in practice it now has either 

the mandate or the organizational capabilities to carry out that role. As noted earlier, in 

January 2001, the Space Commission concluded that "the present interagency process is 

inadequate to address the number, range, and complexity of today's space issues, which 

are expected to increase over time." Would an objective review of the management of 

national space policy since the Space Commission submitted its report reach a similar 

conclusion today? It seems as if the answer is "yes," given how close the conclusions and 

recommendations of the 2008 Allard Commission were to those of the 2001 Space 

Commission. 

There were a number of changes in the White House and interagency management of the 

U.S. space program during the Presidency of George W. Bush. As has already been 

discussed, in 2001 the lead in space policy at the Presidential level was switched from 

OSTP to the NSC, and an NSC official chaired the Space Policy Coordinating 

Committee. The NSC staff (working with the OSTP) drafted the initial versions of the 

five new space policy statements that were issued between 2002 and 2006, which in a 

bureaucratic context provide an important point of leverage. However, space matters 

have been dealt with at a relatively junior level within the NSC structure, including the 

membership of the PCC, and there is still only one NSC staff person with primary 

responsibility for space matters. 

The August 2006 national space policy identifies key areas for top-level attention:

• developing space professionals 

• improving space system development and procurement

• strengthening and maintaining the U.S. space-related science, technology, and 

industrial base 

• increasing and strengthening interagency partnerships. 

Indeed, innovative interagency mechanisms in specific areas of space activity have 

recently emerged as complements to the central management of space policy and 

programs. These include (dating from 1994) the Integrated Program Office for the 

troubled National Polar Orbiting Environmental Satellite System and, since 2004, a 

National Space-based Positioning, Navigation, and Timing (PNT) Executive Committee 

chaired by Deputy Secretaries of Defense and Transportation, supported by a dedicated 

staff, and with an external Space-based PNT Advisory Board. These two structures are 

intended to provide a national perspective in their areas of focus; they operate under the 

guidance provided by White House space policy statements. 

In addition, since 1997, NASA and the national security space community have jointly 

worked through a Partnership Council to discuss issues of mutual interest. Current 

members of the Partnership Council include NASA, U.S. Strategic Command, the Air 

Force Space Command, Defense Research and Engineering, the Office of the 

Undersecretary of the Air Force for Space, the NRO, and the Central Intelligence 
Agency. The council meets at least twice a year at the principals level. This mechanism, 

operating at the interagency level, could be a particularly useful tool if it were linked to a 

broad national perspective on the development and use of spacepower. 

Even so, significant problems in the integration of U.S. space efforts across the four 

sectors of activity remain. A "Committee on U.S. Space Leadership" in March 2009 

noted that "there are serious and systemic problems which portend a broad erosion of 

U.S. leadership and advantage in space." The committee called for establishing a "White 

House focal point and mechanism" for establishing strategic direction and priorities, for 

providing management oversight, and for coordinating decisions and actions across 

departments and agencies.22 

Modest Proposals for Change 

Two of the various recent recommendations seem to have continuing merit for the 

Obama administration: 

• Creating within the National Security Council context (perhaps with OSTP 

involvement as well) some sort of standing interagency body for space involving 

more senior officials than has been the case for the Space Policy Coordinating 

Committee. This would provide for the White House a continuing focus on the 

condition of the Nation's spacepower capabilities and on their use to achieve 

various national objectives. Such a body would need to go beyond the traditional 

National Security Council focus to reflect the interests and perspectives of the 

civilian and commercial space sectors. 

• Providing this body with adequate staff support with experience in all space 

sectors. A separate small space office could be created with one senior director for 

space and two or three other staff members, with one or two coming from outside 

the national security community. Rather than depend on only OSTP staff for 

support, this would mean that the NSC staff would have all the capabilities 

needed to manage the development of space policies and oversee their 

implementation. 

In essence, what could be done is creating a mini-Space Council, but within the overall 

National Security Council structure rather than separate from it. The National Security 

Council historically has had good links to U.S. foreign policy and international interests. 

However, it has more limited experience in dealing with science and technology and 

commercial issues. Creating a National Security Council staff element with officials 

experienced in such issues could provide a comprehensive perspective on spacepower 

issues for the Senior Interagency Group for Space and ultimately for the President. 

The benefits of creating a Presidential Space Advisory Group are not as clear. There is 

limited precedent for the NSC staffing a standing external advisory committee, which 

would have to be the case if the NSC became the central focal point for national space 

issues. (One important exception to this statement is the President's Foreign Intelligence 

Advisory Board.) Given the sensitivity of most issues that are considered in the NSC 
context, there might be issues of adequate clearances and confidentiality of such a group's 

deliberations; and an advisory committee operating under the guidelines of the Federal 

Advisory Committee Act is somewhat at odds with the character of National Security 

Council activities. The Vice President's Space Policy Advisory Board was active for only 

6 months in 1992 at the end of the first Bush administration, so it is difficult to assess its 

value to space policymaking. On the other hand, that board did produce four useful 

reports in its brief existence, suggesting that there could be value in an external advisory 

group operating under rules that allowed access to classified information and confidential 

advice to the Executive Office and the President. 

Most fundamental, however, is convincing the President that the Space Commission was 

correct in its 2001 assessment that "the United States has a vital national interest in space. 

. . . [Space] deserves the attention of the national leadership, from the President on 

down." Providing a structure for effective Presidential space leadership will have limited 

impact if that leadership itself is missing. To enable full value from the Nation's 

spacepower, "sustained leadership must emerge, as it did early in the first [space] age, to 

guide and direct transformation of U.S. space efforts toward realizing their potential to 

serve the national interest."23 

During his Presidential campaign, Barack Obama issued a lengthy statement of his views 

on space that seemed to reflect such a perspective. In addition, he called for 

reestablishing a National Space Council, reporting to him as President. Such a council, he 

suggested, would "oversee and coordinate civilian, military, commercial, and national 

security space activities." It would "solicit public participation, engage the international 

community, and work toward a 21st-century vision of space."

24 As this essay is written, 

the Obama administration is still considering how best to organize itself for space policy. 

But there are strong indications that President Obama recognizes the important 

contributions that space leadership can make to advancing U.S. interests. That realization 

is more important than whatever organizational scheme is ultimately adopted, but its 

translation into policy and actions can certainly be facilitated by an effective White 

House structure for space.

Notes

1. Harold Seidman, Politics, Position, and Power: The Dynamics of Federal Organization (New 

York: Oxford University Press, 1970). 

2. Ibid., 73–74. 

3. Ibid., 76. 

4. Report of the Commission to Assess United States National Security Space Management and 

Organization, January 11, 2001, 82–83. 

5. Ibid., 84–85. 

6. Ibid., 84. 

7. Ibid., 83–84. 

8. Institute for Defense Analyses, Leadership, Management and Organization for National Security 

Space, July 2008, ES–4. 
9. John M. Logsdon et al., eds., Exploring the Unknown: Selected Documents in the History of the 

U.S. Civil Space Program, vol. I, Organizing for Exploration (Washington, DC: NASA Special 

Publication 4407, 1995), 629–630.

10. See John M. Logsdon, The Decision to Go to the Moon: Project Apollo and the National Interest 

(Cambridge: MIT Press, 1970), 23–24, for an account of these organizational steps. 

11. Ibid., 27. 

12. The statement can be found in Logsdon, Exploring the Unknown, 362–373. The quoted material is 

from page 362. 

13. Ibid., 415. 

14. Ibid., 424. 

15. Ibid. See 439–452 for a copy of the memorandum. 

16. White House, Reorganization Plan 1, January 26, 1973, available at 

<www.washingtonwatchdog.org/documents/usc/ttl5/app/0167/0167/index.html>. 

17. Logsdon, Exploring the Unknown, 593. 

18. However, the SIG (Space) mechanism was bypassed as the question of whether to approve 

development of a space station was considered by President Reagan in favor of a Cabinet Council 

on Commerce. 

19. The White House, National Security Policy Directive 1, "Organization of the National Security 

Council System," February 13, 2001, available at <www.fas.org/irp/offdocs/nspd/nspd-1.htm>. 

20. Alan G. Whittaker, Frederick C. Smith, and Elizabeth McKune, The National Security Policy 

Process: The National Security Council and Interagency System (Washington, DC: Industrial 

College of the Armed Forces, National Defense University, August 2005), 25–26. 

21. The text of the fact sheet summarizing the unclassified version of the policy is available at 

<www.ostp.gov/html/US%20National%20Space%20Policy.pdf>. 

22. Committee on U.S. Space Leadership, Memorandum for the President, "America's Leadership in 

Space," March 10, 2009. 

23. Joseph Fuller, Jr., "It's Time for a New Space Age," Aviation Week and Space Technology 166, no. 

2 (January 8, 2007), 7. 

24. Barack Obama, "Advancing the Frontiers of Space Exploration," August 17, 2008. 
Chapter 28:

Space Law and the Advancement of Spacepower

Peter L. Hays

Space law has and should continue to play an essential role in the evolution of 

spacepower. Testing the principle of "freedom of space" and helping establish the legality 

of satellite overflight were primary objectives of National Security Council Directive 

5520, the first U.S. space policy, approved by President Dwight D. Eisenhower in May 

1955;1 during the 1960s, the superpowers and other emerging spacefaring states 

negotiated a far-reaching and forward-thinking Outer Space Treaty (OST);2 and today, a 

variety of transparency and confidence-building measures (TCBMs) for space are being 

discussed and debated in a number of fora.3 Law can be perhaps the single most important 

means of providing structure and predictability to humanity's interactions with the 

cosmos. Justice, reason, and law are nowhere more needed than in the boundless, 

anarchic, and self-help environment of the final frontier. The topics that space law is 

designed to address, the precedents from which it is drawn, and the pathways ahead that 

it illuminates will be critical determinants of the future development of spacepower. 

Although there is some substance to arguments that the OST only precludes those 

military activities that were of little interest to the superpowers and does not bring much 

clarity or direction to many of the most important potential space activities, the treaty 

nonetheless provides a solid and comprehensive foundation upon which to build 

additional legal structures needed to advance spacepower. Spacefaring actors can most 

effectively improve on this foundation through a number of actions including further 

developing and refining the OST regime, adapting the most useful parts of analogous 

regimes such as the Law of the Sea and Seabed Authority mechanisms, and rejecting 

standards that stifle innovation, inadequately address threats to humanity's survival, or do 

not provide opportunities for rewards commensurate with risks undertaken. In the three 

sections below, this chapter explores other specific ways improvements in space law may 

contribute to furthering the quest for sustainable space security, enabling more direct 

creation of wealth in and from space, and ultimately improving the odds for humanity's 

survival by helping to protect the Earth and space environments. Without clearer and 

better developed space law, humanity may squander opportunities and investments, 

making it more difficult for spacepower to enable these and other critical contributions to 

our future. 

While desires for better refined space law to advance spacepower may be clear, progress 

toward developing and implementing improvements is not likely to be fast or easy. 

Terrestrial law evolved fairly steadily and has operated over millennia. Space law, by 

contrast, is a relatively novel concept that rapidly emerged within a few years of the 

opening of the space age and thereafter greatly slowed. The objectives of space law must 

include not just aspirational goals such as structuring competition between humans and 
helping define and refine fundamental interactions between humanity and the cosmos but 

also more mundane issues such as property rights and commercial interests. It is likely 

there will be growing pressure for space law to provide greater predictability and 

structure in many areas despite the fact that it can be very difficult to establish 

foundational legal elements for the cosmic realm such as evidence, causality, attribution, 

and precedence. Moreover, any movement toward improving space law is likely to be 

slowed by discouraging attributes associated with spacepower that include very long 

timelines and prospects for only potential or intangible benefits. These factors can erode 

acceptance of and support for improving space law at both the personal and political 

levels, but they also point to the need for an incremental approach and reinforce the longterm value of law in providing stability and predictability. 

Other impediments to further developing space law are exacerbated by a lack of 

acceptance in some quarters that sustained, cooperative efforts are often the best and 

sometimes the only way in which humanity can address our most pressing survival 

challenges. Cosmic threats to humanity's survival exist and include the depletion of 

resources and fouling of our only current habitat, threats in the space environment such as 

large objects that could strike Earth and cause cataclysmic damage, and the eventual 

exhaustion and destruction of the Sun. The message is clear: environmental degradation 

and space phenomena can threaten our existence, but humanity can improve our odds for 

survival if we can cooperate in grasping and exploiting survival opportunities. Law can 

provide one of the most effective ways to structure and use these opportunities. Sustained 

dialogue of the type this volume seeks to foster can help raise awareness, generate 

support for better space law, and ultimately nurture the spacepower needed to improve 

our odds for survival. 

The Quest for Sustainable Security 

In examining space law, spacepower, and humanity's quest for sustainable security, it is 

prudent for spacefaring actors to transcend traditional categories and approaches by 

considering resources in novel, broad, and multidimensional ways. This chapter attempts 

to employ the spirit of this unrestrained approach but is not suggesting that everything 

discussed would necessarily turn out to be useful or implementable in the real world. In 

addition, it is often not practical or even possible to examine space law developments in 

discrete ways by delineating between legal, technical, and policy considerations or 

between terrestrial and space security concerns. Over the long run, however, an 

expansive approach will undoubtedly reveal and help create the most opportunities to 

advance space law and spacepower in the most significant and lasting ways. Nonetheless, 

when beginning the journey, small, incremental steps are the most pragmatic way to 

develop and implement more effective space law, and the process should first focus on 

improving and refining the foundation provided by the OST regime. 

Most spacefaring actors understand the merits and overall value of the OST regime; they 

are much more interested in building upon this foundation than in creating a new 

structure. As the most important first steps toward further developing space law, the 

international community needs to find better ways to achieve more universal adherence to 
the regime's foundational norms and embed all important spacefaring actors more 

completely within the regime. Beginning work to include major non-state actors in more 

explicit ways could prove to be a difficult undertaking that would require substantial 

expansion of the regime and probably should be approached incrementally. Fortunately, 

the security dimensions of the regime have opened windows of opportunity and important 

precedents have been set by expanding participation in the United Nations Committee on 

the Peaceful Uses of Outer Space and the World Radio Conferences of the International 

Telecommunications Union (ITU) to include nonstate actors as observers or associate 

members. Some form of two-tiered participation structure within the OST regime might 

be appropriate for a number of years and it may prove impractical to include nonstate 

actors in a formal treaty, but steps toward expanded participation should begin now, both 

to capture the growing spacepower of nonstate actors and to harness their energy in 

helping achieve more universal adherence to the regime. Perhaps most importantly, these 

initial steps should help promote a sense of stewardship for space among more actors and 

increase attention on those parties that fail to join or comply with these norms. Of course, 

these first steps alone would be insufficient to make large improvements or assure 

compliance with the regime, yet they might be among the most easily undertaken and 

significant ways to advance space law in the near term. Other specific areas within the 

OST regime that should be better developed, perhaps through creation of a standing body 

with implementation responsibilities, include the article VI obligations for signatories to

authorize and exercise continuing supervision over space activities and the article IX 

responsibilities for signatories to undertake or request appropriate international 

consultations before proceeding with any activity or experiment that would cause 

potentially harmful interference. 

One key way the United States could help better define OST implementation obligations 

and demonstrate leadership in fostering cooperative spacepower would be to share space 

situational awareness (SSA) data globally in more effective ways through the 

Commercial and Foreign Entities (CFE) program or some other approach. Congress has 

extended the CFE Pilot Program through September 2010 and, following the February 

2009 collision between the Iridium and Cosmos satellites, there is more worldwide 

attention focused on space debris and spaceflight safety as well as considerable 

motivation for the United States to improve the program by providing SSA data to more 

users in more timely and consistent ways. A most useful specific goal for the CFE 

program would be development of a U.S. Government–operated data center for 

ephemeris, propagation data, and premaneuver notifications for all active satellites; 

consideration should also be given to the utility and modalities of creating or 

transitioning such a data center to international auspices.4 Users would voluntarily 

contribute data to the center, perhaps through a Global Positioning System (GPS) 

transponder on each satellite, and the data would be constantly updated, freely available, 

and readily accessible so that it could be used by satellite operators to plan for and avoid 

conjunctions.5 Difficult legal, technical, and policy issues that inhibit progress on sharing 

SSA data include bureaucratic inertia, liability, and proprietary concerns; nonuniform 

data formatting standards and incompatibility between propagators and other cataloguing 

tools; and security concerns over exclusion of certain satellites from any public data. 

Some of these legal concerns could be addressed by working toward better cradle-to-
grave tracking of all catalogued objects to help establish the launching state and liability; 

using opaque processes to exclude proprietary information from public databases to the 

maximum extent feasible; and indemnifying program operators, even if they provide 

faulty data that results in a collision, so long as they operate in good faith, exercise 

reasonable care, and follow established procedures. 

History suggests there is a very important role for militaries both in setting the stage for 

the emergence of international legal regimes and in enforcing the norms of those regimes 

once they are in place. Development of any TCBMs for space, such as rules of the road 

or codes of conduct, should draw closely from the development and operation of such 

measures in other domains such as sea or air. The international community should 

consider the most appropriate means of separating military activities from civil and 

commercial activities in the building of these measures because advocating a single 

standard for how all space activities ought to be regulated or controlled is inappropriately 

ambitious and not likely to be helpful. The U.S. Department of Defense requires safe and 

responsible operations by warships and military aircraft but they are not legally required 

to follow all the same rules as commercial traffic and sometimes operate within specially 

protected zones that separate them from other traffic. Full and open dialogue about these 

ideas and others will help develop space rules that draw from years of experience in 

operating in these other domains and make the most sense for the unique operational 

characteristics of space. Other concerns surround the implications of various 

organizational structures and rules of engagement for potential military operations in 

space. Should such forces operate under national or only international authority, who 

should decide when certain activities constitute a threat, and how should such forces be 

authorized to engage threats, especially if such engagements might create other threats or 

potentially cause harm to humans or space systems? Clearly, these and a number of other 

questions are very difficult to address and require careful international vetting well before 

actual operation of such forces in space. Finally, consider the historic role of the Royal 

and U.S. Navies in fighting piracy, promoting free trade, and enforcing global norms 

against slave trading. Should there be analogous roles in space for the U.S. military and 

other military forces today and in the future? What would be the space component of the 

Proliferation Security Initiative and how might the United States and others encourage 

like-minded actors to cooperate on such an initiative? Attempts to create legal regimes or 

enforcement norms that do not specifically include and build upon military capabilities 

are likely to be divorced from pragmatic realities and ultimately be frustrating efforts.6 

Seemingly new U.S. focus and direction on space TCBMs initially was provided by a 

statement that appeared on the Obama administration White House Web site on January 

20, 2009: "Ensure Freedom of Space: The Obama-Biden administration will restore 

American leadership on space issues, seeking a worldwide ban on weapons that interfere 

with military and commercial satellites."7 The language about seeking a worldwide ban 

on space weapons was similar to position papers issued during the Obama-Biden 

campaign but much less detailed and nuanced; it drew considerable attention and some 

criticism.8 By May 2009, the "Space" part of the Defense Issues section on the White 

House Web site had been changed to read: 
Space: The full spectrum of U.S. military capabilities depends on our space systems. To 

maintain our technological edge and protect assets in this domain, we will continue to 

invest in next-generation capabilities such as operationally responsive space and global 

positioning systems. We will cooperate with our allies and the private sector to identify 

and protect against intentional and unintentional threats to U.S. and allied space 

capabilities. 

Ongoing space policy reviews including a congressionally directed Space Posture Review 

and Presidential Study Directives on National Space Policy are likely to encourage 

policies that are more supportive of pursuing TCBMs as well as greater reliance on 

commercial and international partners.9 Consideration is also being given to the best ways 

to reconcile any new approaches with the 2006 U.S. National Space Policy language 

about opposing "development of new legal regimes or other restrictions that seek to 

prohibit or limit U.S. access to or use of space" while encouraging "international 

cooperation with foreign nations and/ or consortia on space activities that are of mutual 

benefit."10 Spacepower actors can expect to continue making progress in developing 

effective, sustainable, and cooperative approaches to space security by building on the 

ongoing thoughtful dialogue between all major space actors in several venues that 

emphasizes a number of mainly incremental, pragmatic, technical, and bottom-up steps. 

Prime examples of this approach include the February 2008 adoption by the United 

Nations General Assembly of the Inter-Agency Debris Coordination Committee (IADC) 

voluntary guidelines for mitigating space debris and the December 2008 release from the 

Council of the European Union of a draft Code of Conduct for outer space activities.11 

Beyond the OST, efforts to craft comprehensive, formal, top-down space arms control or 

regulation continue to face the same significant problems that have overwhelmed 

attempts to develop such mechanisms in the past. The most serious of these problems 

include disagreements over the proper forum, scope, and object for negotiations; basic 

definitional issues about what is a "space weapon" and how they might be categorized as 

offensive or defensive and stabilizing or destabilizing; and daunting concerns about 

whether adequate monitoring and verification mechanisms can be found for any 

comprehensive and formalized TCBMs. These problems relate to a number of thorny 

specific issues such as whether the negotiations should be primarily among only major 

spacefaring actors or more multilateral, what satellites and other terrestrial systems 

should be covered, and whether the object should be control of space weapons or TCBMs 

for space; the types of TCBMs that might be most useful (for example, rules of the road 

or keep-out zones) and how these approaches might be reconciled with the existing space 

law regime; and verification problems such as how to address the latent or residual 

antisatellite (ASAT) capabilities possessed by many dual-use and military systems or 

how to deal with the significant military potential of even a small number of covert 

ASAT systems. 

New space system technologies, continuing growth of the commercial space sector, and 

new verification and monitoring methods interact with these existing problems in 

complex ways. Some of the changes would seem to favor TCBMs, such as better radars 

and optical systems for improved SSA, attribution, and verification capabilities; 
technologies for better space system diagnostics; and the stabilizing potential of 

redundant and distributed space architectures that create many nodes by employing larger 

numbers of smaller and less expensive satellites. Many other trends, however, would 

seem to make space arms control and regulation even more difficult. For example, microor nanosatellites might be used as virtually undetectable active ASATs or passive space 

mines; proliferation of space technology has radically increased the number of significant 

space actors to include a number of nonstate actors that have developed or are developing 

sophisticated dual-use technologies such as autonomous rendezvous and docking 

capabilities; satellite communications technology can easily be used to jam rather than 

communicate; and growth in the commercial space sector raises issues such as how 

quasi-military systems could be protected or negated and the unclear security 

implications of global markets for dual-use space capabilities and products. 

There is disagreement about the relative utility of top-down versus bottom-up approaches 

to developing space TCBMs and formal arms control but, following creation of the OST 

regime, the United States and many other major spacefaring actors have tended to favor 

bottom-up approaches, a point strongly emphasized by U.S. Ambassador Donald Mahley 

in February 2008: "Since the 1970s, five consecutive U.S. administrations have 

concluded it is impossible to achieve an effectively verifiable and militarily meaningful 

space arms control agreement."12 Yet this assessment may be somewhat myopic since 

strategists need to consider not only the well-known difficulties with top-down 

approaches but also the potential opportunity costs of inaction and to recognize when 

they may need to trade some loss of sovereignty and flexibility for stability and restraints 

on others. Since the United States has not tested a kinetic energy ASAT since September 

1985 and has no program to develop such capabilities, would it have been better to 

foreclose this option in order to purse a global ban on testing kinetic energy ASATs, and 

would such an effort have produced a restraining effect on Chinese development and 

testing of ASAT capabilities? This may have been a lost opportunity to pursue legal 

approaches but is a complex, multidimensional, and interdependent issue shaped by a 

variety of other factors such as inabilities to distinguish between ballistic missile defense 

and ASAT technologies, reluctance to limit technical options after the end of the Cold 

War, emergence of new and less easily deterred threats, and the demise of the AntiBallistic Missile Treaty. 

Moreover, the Chinese, in particular, apparently disagree with pursuing only bottom-up 

approaches and, in ways that seem both shrewd and hypocritical, are currently developing 

significant counterspace capabilities while simultaneously advancing various top-down 

proposals in support of prevention of an arms race in outer space initiatives and moving 

ahead with the joint Chinese-Russian draft treaty on Prevention of Placement of Weapons 

in Outer Space (PPWT) introduced at the Conference on Disarmament in February 2008. 

If the Chinese are attempting to pursue a two-track approach to space arms control, they 

need to present that argument to the international community much more explicitly. The 

current draft PPWT goes to considerable lengths in attempting to define space, space 

objects, weapons in space, placement in space, and the use or threat of force, but there are 

still very considerable definitional issues with respect to how specific capabilities would 

be classified. An even more significant problem relates to all the terrestrial capabilities 
that are able to eliminate, damage, or disrupt the normal function of objects in outer 

space, such as the Chinese direct ascent ASAT. One must question the utility of a 

proposed agreement that does not address the significant security implications of current 

space system support for network enabled terrestrial warfare, does not deal with dual-use 

space capabilities, seems to be focused on a class of weapons that does not exist or at 

least is not deployed in space, is silent about all the terrestrial capabilities that are able to 

produce weapons effects in space, and would not even ban development and testing of 

space weapons, only their use.13 Given these weaknesses in the PPWT, it seems plausible 

that it is designed as much to continue political pressure on the United States and derail 

U.S. missile defense efforts as it is to promote sustainable space security. 

Since Sino-American relations in general and space relations in particular are likely to 

play a dominant role in shaping the quest for space-power and sustainable security during 

this century, other proposed Sino-American cooperative space ventures or TCBMs are 

worthy of further consideration, including inviting a taikonaut to fly on one of the 

remaining space shuttle missions and making specific, repeated, and public invitations for 

the Chinese to join the International Space Station program and other major cooperative 

international space efforts. The United States and China could also work toward 

developing nonoffensive defenses of the type advocated by Philip Baines.14 Kevin 

Pollpeter explains how China and the United States could cooperate in promoting the 

safety of human spaceflight and "coordinate space science missions to derive scientific 

benefits and to share costs. Coordinating space science missions with separately 

developed, but complementary space assets, removes the chance of sensitive technology 

transfer and allows the two countries to combine their resources to achieve the same 

effects as jointly developed missions."15 Michael Pillsbury outlined six other areas where 

U.S. experts could profitably exchange views with Chinese specialists in a dialogue about 

space weapons issues: "reducing Chinese misperceptions of U.S. Space Policy, increasing 

Chinese transparency on space weapons, probing Chinese interest in verifiable 

agreements, multilateral versus bilateral approaches, economic consequences of use of

space weapons, and reconsideration of U.S. high-tech exports to China."16 Finally, Bruce 

MacDonald's report for the Council on Foreign Relations, "China, Space Weapons, and 

U.S. Security," offers a number of noteworthy additional specific recommendations for 

both the United States and China. For the United States, MacDonald recommends 

assessing the impact of different U.S. and Chinese offensive space postures and policies 

through intensified analysis and "crisis games" in addition to wargames; evaluating the 

desirability of a "no first use" pledge for offensive counterspace weapons that have 

irreversible effects; pursuing selected offensive capabilities meeting important criteria—

including effectiveness, reversible effects, and survivability—in a deterrence context to 

be able to negate adversary space capabilities on a temporary and reversible basis; 

refraining from further direct ascent ASAT tests and demonstrations as long as China 

does, unless there is a substantial risk to human health and safety from uncontrolled space 

object reentry; and entering negotiations on a kinetic energy ASAT testing ban. 

MacDonald's recommendations for China include providing more transparency into its 

military space programs; refraining from further direct ascent ASAT tests as long as the 

United States does; establishing a senior national security coordinating body, equivalent 

to a Chinese National Security Council; strengthening its leadership's foreign policy 
understanding by increasing the international affairs training of senior officer candidates 

and establishing an international security affairs office within the People's Liberation 

Army; providing a clear and credible policy and doctrinal context for its 2007 ASAT test 

and counterspace programs more generally, and addressing foreign concerns over China's 

ASAT test; and offering to engage in dialogue with the United States on mutual space 

concerns and become actively involved in discussions on establishing international space 

codes of conduct and confidence-building measures.17 

Harvesting Energy and Creating Wealth in and from Space 

Spacefaring actors should again consider revising and further developing the OST regime 

as a key first step when seeking better ways to harvest energy and create wealth in and 

from space. Expanding participation in the OST as recommended above would also be 

helpful, but other steps such as reducing liability concerns and clarifying legal issues with 

respect to harvesting energy and generating wealth are likely to be more effective in 

furthering commercial development of space. Of course, as with security, a range of 

objectives and values are in tension and require considerable effort to change or keep 

properly balanced. The OST has been extremely successful thus far with respect to its 

primary objective of precluding replication of the colonial exploitation that plagued much 

of Earth's history. The international community should now consider whether the dangers 

posed by potential cosmic land grabs continue to warrant OST interpretations that may be 

stifling development of spacepower, and, if these values are found to have become 

imbalanced, how impediments might best be reduced. Spacefaring actors should again 

use an expansive approach to consider how perceived OST restrictions and the 

commercial space sector have evolved and might be further advanced in a variety of ways 

including reinterpreting the OST regime itself, becoming more intentional about 

developing spacepower, creating space-based solar power capabilities, and improving 

export controls. 

While the OST has thus far been unambiguous and successful in foreclosing sovereignty 

claims and the ills of colonization, it has been less clear and effective with respect to de 

facto property rights and other liability and commercialization issues. OST language, 

negotiating history, and subsequent practice do not preclude some level of commercial 

activity in space and on celestial bodies, but various articles of the OST support different 

interpretations about the potential scope of and limitations on this activity. The treaty 

most clearly allows those commercial activities that would be performed to support 

exploration or scientific efforts. It is far more problematic with respect to commercial 

space activity that would result in private gain or not somehow equitably distribute gains 

among all states. Even if it were found that commercial activities would not "appropriate" 

space resources, however that might be defined, it would be difficult to reconcile such 

activity with the spirit of the OST regime, especially since the regime provides no 

guidance on how private or unequal gains might be distributed. In addition to clarifying 

potential property rights and wealth distribution mechanisms, consideration should be 

given to reevaluating liability standards. The OST and 1972 Liability Convention 

establish two distinct liability structures: launching states are absolutely liable to pay 

compensation for any damages caused by space objects on Earth or to aircraft in flight 
but are only liable for damages caused in space by space objects if found to be negligent. 

A challenge for the international community is how best to evolve the existing space law 

regime based on either absolute liability or fault/negligence, depending upon the location 

of the incident, into a structure that might provide enough clarity to help establish 

liability for damages in space and perhaps provide better incentives for commercial 

development.18 

Additional interpretation issues stem from the fact that OST is embedded within a larger 

body of international law and that broad regime is evolving, sometimes in ambiguous and 

contradictory ways. Elements within this large regime are of unclear and unequal weight: 

the Moon Agreement with its Common Heritage of Mankind (CHM) approach to 

communal property rights and equally shared rewards undoubtedly has some effect in 

advancing the CHM principle in both formal and customary international law. At the 

level of formal international law, however, the Moon Treaty falls well short of the OST 

due to its lack of parties, especially among major spacefaring states, particularly in 

contrast to the OST, a treaty that has been ratified by some 94 states and in force for over 

40 years. 

Most fundamentally, however, the current lack of clarity within space law about property 

rights and commercial interests is the result of both space law and space technology being 

underdeveloped and immature. Of course, there is also a "chicken-and-egg" factor at 

work since actors are discouraged from undertaking the test cases needed to develop and 

mature the regime because of the immaturity of the regime and their unwillingness to 

develop and employ improved technologies and processes as guinea pigs in whatever 

legal processes would be used to resolve property rights and reward structures. The most 

effective way to move past this significant hurdle would be to create more clear 

mechanisms for establishing property rights and processes by which all actors, especially 

commercial actors, could receive rewards commensurate with the risks they undertake. In 

addition, any comprehensive reevaluation of space property rights and liability concerns 

should also consider how these factors are addressed in analogous regimes such as the 

Seabed Authority in the Law of the Sea Treaty. Unfortunately, however, there are also 

several problems with attempting to draw from these precedents. First, several of the 

analogous regimes like the Law of the Sea build from CMH premises in several ways and 

it is not clear this approach is entirely applicable or helpful when attempting to sort 

through how the OST should apply to issues like property rights and reward structures. 

Second, while these analogous regimes are undoubtedly better developed than the OST 

and have a significant potential role in providing precedents, today they are still 

somewhat underdeveloped and immature with respect to their application in difficult 

areas such as property rights and reward structures, again limiting the current utility of 

attempting to draw from these precedents. 

Provisions of the OST regime are probably the most important factors in shaping 

commercial space activity, but they are clearly not the only noteworthy legal and policy 

factors at work influencing developments within this sector. Legacy legal and policy 

structures developed during the Cold War were probably adequate for the amount of 

commercial space activity during that period, but it is far from clear they will be 
sufficient to address the significant and sustained increase in such activity since that time. 

In the 1960s, the United States was the first to begin developing space services such as 

communications, remote sensing, and launch capabilities but did so within the 

government sector. This approach began to change in the 1980s, first with the November

1984 Presidential Determination to allow some commercial communication services to 

compete with Intelsat and continuing with subsequent policies designed to foster 

development of a commercial space sector. By the late 1990s, commercial space activity 

worldwide had outpaced government activity, and although government space 

investments remain very important, they are likely to become increasingly overshadowed 

by commercial activity. It would be helpful if governments, and the U.S. Government in 

particular, could more explicitly develop and consistently implement legal structures and 

long-term policies that would better define and delineate between those space activities 

that ought to be pursued by the private and public sectors as well as more intentionally 

and consistently develop the desired degree of international cooperation in pursuing these 

objectives. 

Other clear commercial and economic distinctions with the Cold War era have even more 

significant implications for the future of space-power: whereas the Soviet Union was only 

a military superpower, China is a major U.S. trading partner and an economic superpower 

that recently passed Germany to became the world's third largest economy, is poised to 

pass Japan soon, and is on a path to become larger than the U.S. economy, perhaps within 

only about 10 years. Because of its economic muscle, China can afford to devote 

commensurately more resources to its military capabilities and will play a more 

significant role in structuring the global economic system. For example, China holds an 

estimated $1.4 trillion in foreign assets (mainly U.S. treasury notes), an amount that gives 

it great leverage in the structure of the system.19 

The United States and other major spacefaring actors lack, but undoubtedly need, much 

more open and comprehensive visions for how to develop spacepower. This study is one 

attempt to foster more dialogue about these issues, but the process should continue, 

become more intentional and formalized, and be supported by an enduring organizational

structure that includes the most important stakeholders in the future of spacepower. Legal 

structures should be a foundational part of creating and implementing the vision to 

develop spacepower, but a broader approach should be: 

focused on opening space as a medium for the full spectrum of human 

activity and commercial enterprise, and those actions which government 

can take to promote and enable it, through surveys, infrastructure 

development, pre-competitive technology, and encouraging incentive 

structures (prizes, anchor-customer contracts, and property/exclusivity 

rights), regulatory regimes (port authorities, spacecraft licensing, publicprivate partnerships) and supporting services (open interface standards, 

RDT&E [research, development, test, and evaluation] facilities, rescue, 

etc.).20 
In addition, consideration should be given to using other innovative mechanisms and 

nontraditional routes to space development, including a much wider range of Federal 

Government organizations and the growing number of state spaceport authorities and 

other organizations developing needed infrastructure. Finally, the United States should 

make comprehensive and careful exploration of the potential of space-based solar power 

its leading pathfinder in creating a vision for developing spacepower. Working toward 

harvesting this unlimited power source in economically viable ways will require 

development of appropriate supporting legal structures, particularly with respect to 

indemnification and potential public-private partnerships. 

Global licensing and export controls for space technology have often been developed and 

implemented in inconsistent and counterproductive ways. It is understandable that many 

states view space technology as a key strategic resource and are very concerned about 

developing, protecting, and preventing the proliferation of this technology, but the 

international community, and the United States in particular, needs to find better legal 

mechanisms to balance and advance objectives in this area. Many current problems with 

U.S. export controls began after Hughes and Loral worked with insurance companies to 

analyze Chinese launch failures in January 1995 and February 1996. A congressional 

review completed in 1998 (Cox Report) determined these analyses violated the 

International Traffic in Arms Regulations (ITAR) by communicating technical 

information to the Chinese. The 1999 National Defense Authorization Act transferred 

export controls for all satellites and related items from the Commerce Department to the 

Munitions List administered by the State Department.21 The stringent Munitions List 

controls contributed to a severe downturn in U.S. satellite exports.22 To avoid these 

restrictions, foreign satellite manufacturers, beginning in 2002 with Alcatel Space (now 

Thales) and followed by European Aeronautic Defense and Space, Surrey Satellite 

Company, and others replaced all U.S.-built components on their satellites to make them 

"ITAR-free."23 

There are two key reasons why the United States should move away from the priorities in 

its current space export control regime. First, an overly broad approach that tries to guard 

too many things dilutes monitoring resources and actually results in less protection for 

"crown jewels" than does a focused approach, and second, a more open approach is more 

likely to foster innovation, spur development of sectors of comparative advantage, and 

improve efficiency and overall economic growth. Congress and the Obama 

administration should make it a priority to reevaluate current U.S. export controls and 

adjust laws and policies accordingly. Excellent starting points are the recently released 

recommendations for rebalancing overall U.S. export control priorities in the 

congressionally mandated National Academies of Science study.24 In addition, the United 

States should implement key recommendations from the Center for Strategic and 

International Studies study on the space industrial base such as removing from the 

Munitions List commercial communications satellite systems, dedicated subsystems, and 

components specifically designed for commercial use.25 

Environmental Sustainability and Survival 
Work toward developing space law to advance spacepower and improve environmental 

sustainability and humanity's odds for survival faces a number of daunting challenges, 

including a high "giggle factor," long timelines that can be beyond our political and 

personal awareness, and potential returns that are uncertain and intangible. While 

difficult, work in this area is absolutely critical since it may hold the key to humanity's 

survival, and it must be pursued with all the resources, consistency, and seriousness it 

deserves. The quest to improve space law to support environmental and survival 

objectives should focus on three areas: space debris, environmental monitoring, and 

planetary defense. 

Human space activity produces many orbital objects; when these objects no longer serve 

a useful function, they are classified as space debris. Over time, human activity has 

generated an increasing amount of debris; the number of catalogued debris objects has 

gone from about 8,000 to over 18,000 during the past 20 years.26 The most serious cause 

of debris is deliberate hypervelocity impacts between large objects at high orbital 

altitudes such as the Chinese direct ascent kinetic energy ASAT weapon test of January 

2007, which now accounts for more than 25 percent of all catalogued objects in low Earth 

orbit (LEO).27 If current trends continue, there is growing risk that space, and LEO in 

particular, will become increasingly unusable. Fortunately, there is also growing 

awareness and earnestness across the international community in addressing this threat. 

Overall goals for spacefaring actors with respect to space debris include minimizing its 

creation while mitigating and remediating its effects—space law can play an important 

role in all these areas. Key approaches to minimizing creation of debris are commercial 

best practices and evolving regimes such as the IADC voluntary guidelines adopted by 

the United Nations General Assembly in February 2008. Spacefaring actors also need to 

consider mechanisms to transition these voluntary guidelines into more binding standards 

and ways to impose specific costs such as sanctions or fines on actors that negligently or 

deliberately create long-lived debris. Fines could be applied toward efforts to further 

develop and educate spacefaring actors about the debris mitigation regime as well as to 

create and implement remediation techniques. An additional potential source of funding 

for mitigation and remediation would be establishing auctions for the radio frequency 

spectrum controlled by the ITU that would be analogous to the spectrum auctions 

conducted at the national level by organizations like the Federal Communications 

Commission. Finally, it must be emphasized that techniques for remediating debris using 

lasers or other methods are likely to have significant potential as ASAT weapons, and 

careful international consideration should be given to how and by whom such systems are 

operated. 

Space provides a unique location to monitor and potentially remediate Earth's climate. It 

is the only location from which simultaneous in situ observations of Earth's climate 

activity can be conducted, and such observations are essential to developing a long-term 

understanding of potential changes in our biosphere. Because so much is riding on our 

understanding of the global climate and our potential responses to perceived changes, it is 

particularly important to apply apolitical standards in getting the science right and 

controlling for known space effects such as solar cycles when making these observations. 

If fears about global warming are correct and the global community wishes to take active 
measures to remediate these effects, space also provides a unique location to operate 

remediation options such as orbital solar shades. 

It is also imperative that the United States and all spacefaring actors think more creatively 

about using spacepower to transcend traditional and emerging threats to our survival. 

Parts of space law can help to illuminate paths toward and develop incentives for creating 

a better future. Space, perhaps more than any other medium, is inherently linked to 

humanity's future and survival. We need to link these ideas and better articulate ways 

spacepower can light a path toward genuinely cooperative approaches for protecting the 

Earth and space environments from cataclysmic events such as large objects that may 

collide with Earth or gamma ray bursts that may have the potential to render huge swaths 

of space uninhabitable. Better knowledge about known threats such as near Earth objects 

(NEOs) is being acquired but more urgency is needed. All predicted near approaches and 

possible NEO impacts such as that of the asteroid Apophis, predicted for April 13, 2029, 

ought to be seen as opportunities since they provide critical real-world tests for our ability 

to be proactive in developing effective precision tracking and NEO mitigation 

capabilities. In the near term, it is most important for national and international 

organizations to be specifically charged with and resourced to develop better 

understanding of NEO threats and mitigation techniques that can be effectively applied 

against likely impacts. Ultimately, however, we cannot know of or effectively plan for all 

potential threats to Earth but should pursue a multidimensional approach to develop 

capabilities to improve our odds for survival and one day perhaps become a 

multiplanetary species. 

There will be inevitable missteps, setbacks, and unintended consequences as we refine 

space law to improve our quest for sustainable space security, generate wealth in and 

from space, and protect the Earth and space environments. The inexorable laws of 

physics and of human interaction indicate that we will create the best opportunities for 

success in improving space law by beginning long-term, patient work now rather than 

crash programs later. This patient approach will allow the best prospects for space law to 

provide a solid foundation for the peaceful advancement of spacepower.

Notes

1. The best and most comprehensive analysis of the complex maneuvering by the superpowers at the 

opening of the space age remains Walter A. McDougall's Pulitzer Prize–winning . . . the Heavens 

and the Earth: A Political History of the Space Age (New York: Basic Books, 1985). National 

Security Council Directive 5520 is reprinted in John M. Logsdon, ed. Exploring the Unknown: 

Selected Documents in the History of the U.S. Civil Space Program, vol. I, Organizing for 

Exploration (Washington, DC: NASA History Office, 1995), 308–313. McDougall in Heavens 

and Earth and R. Cargill Hall's introductory essay, "Origins of U.S. Space Policy: Eisenhower, 

Open Skies, and Freedom of Space," in Exploring the Unknown masterfully develop the context 

and purposes of the directive. Hall uses the term stalking horse to describe the purpose of the IGY 

satellite in relation to the WS–117L (America's first reconnaissance satellite program). Peaceful 

purposes for space activity are often referenced and cited but never authoritatively defined. 
2. Treaty on Principles Governing the Activities of States in the Exploration and Use of Outer Space, 

including the Moon and Other Celestial Bodies (General Assembly resolution 2222 [XXI], annex 

), adopted December 19, 1966, opened for signature January 27, 1967, and entered into force 

October 10, 1967. 

3. The term transparency apparently connotes espionage when translated into Chinese and since the 

Chinese are a key party that spacefaring actors wish to engage, consideration should be given to 

finding an alternative term, perhaps clarity of intensions. 

4. For an outstanding and detailed analysis of the benefits and challenges associated with creation of 

an international data center, see Lee-Volker Cox, "Avoiding Collisions in Space: Is It Time for an 

International Space Integration Center?" research paper, U.S. Army War College, March 30, 2007, 

available at <www.dtic.mil/cgibin/GetTRDoc?AD=ADA469676&Location=U2&doc=GetTRDoc.pdf>. 

5. Space situational awareness (SSA) issues are framed by specialized concepts and jargon. 

Conjunctions are close approaches, or potential collisions, between objects in orbit. Propagators 

are complex modeling tools used to predict the future location of orbital objects. Satellite 

operators currently use a number of different propagators and have different standards for 

evaluating and potentially maneuvering away from conjunctions. Maneuvering requires fuel and 

shortens the operational life of satellites. Orbital paths are described by a set of variables known as 

ephemeris data; two-line element sets are the most commonly used ephemeris data. Much of this 

data is contained in the form of a satellite catalog. The United States maintains a public catalog at 

<www.space-track. org>. Other entities maintain their own catalogs. Orbital paths constantly are 

perturbed by a number a factors including Earth's inconsistent gravity gradient, solar activity, and 

the gravitational pull of other orbital objects. Perturbations cause propagation of orbital paths to 

become increasingly inaccurate over time; beyond approximately 4 days into the future, 

predictions about the location of orbital objects can be significantly inaccurate. For more about 

SSA concepts, see Brian Weeden, "The Numbers Game," The Space Review, July 13, 2009, 

available at <www.thespacereview.com/article/1417/1>. For discussion about ways to share SSA 

data and other space security ideas fostered by meetings between the Department of Defense 

Executive Agent for Space and the Chief Executive Officers of commercial satellite operators, see 

David McGlade, "Commentary: Preserving the Orbital Environment," Space News, February 19, 

2007, 27. 

6. On the role of militaries in enforcing legal norms and analogies between the law of the sea and 

space law, see R. Joseph DeSutter, "Space Control, Diplomacy, and Strategic Integration," Space 

and Defense 1, no. 1 (Fall 2006), 29–51. 

7. The statement appeared on the Defense Agenda section of the White House Web site, available at 

<www.whitehouse.gov>. 

8. See in particular, the Space News editorial for February 2, 2009, "Banning Space Weapons— and 

Reality." 

9. Section 913 of the Fiscal Year 2009 National Defense Authorization Act (P.L. 110–417) directs 

the Secretary of Defense and Director of National Intelligence to submit a Space Posture Review 

to Congress by December 1, 2009. In addition, the Obama administration has ongoing Presidential 

Study Directives that are examining the need for changes to current National Space Policy; see 

Amy Klamper, "White House Orders Sweeping U.S. Space Policy Review," Space News, July 15, 

2009. 

10. The unclassified version of current National Space Policy was posted on the Office of Science and 

Technology Policy Web site on October 14, 2006. 

11. United Nations General Assembly Resolution 62/217, "International Cooperation in the Peaceful 

Uses of Outer Space," February 1, 2008, and Council of the European Union, "Council 

Conclusions and Draft Code of Conduct for Outer Space Activity," December 3, 2008. 

12. Ambassador Donald A. Mahley, remarks at the State of Space Security Workshop, Space Policy 

Institute, George Washington University, Washington, DC, February 1, 2008. 

13. Fact sheet, "Preventing the Placement of Weapons in Outer Space: A Backgrounder on the Draft 

Treaty by Russia and China," ReachingCriticalWill.org, available at <www.reachingcriticalwill. 

org/legal/paros/wgroup/PAROS-PPWT-factsheet.pdf>. For an outstanding analysis of trigger 

events for space weaponization and why space-basing is not necessarily the most important 

consideration, see Barry D. Watts, The Military Use of Space: A Diagnostic Assessment 
(Washington, DC: Center for Strategic and Budgetary Assessments, February 2001), 97–106. 

Watts argues: There are at least two paths by which orbital space might become a battleground for 

human conflict. One consists of dramatic, hard-to-miss trigger events such as the use of nuclear 

weapons to attack orbital assets. The other class involves more gradual changes such as a series of 

small, seemingly innocuous steps over a period of years that would, only in hindsight, be 

recognized as having crossed the boundary from force enhancement to force application. For 

reasons stemming from the railroad analogy . . . the slippery slope of halting, incremental steps 

toward force application may be the most likely path of the two. Watts discusses high-altitude 

nuclear detonations, failure of nuclear deterrence, and threats to use nuclear ballistic missiles 

during a crisis as the most likely of the dramatic trigger events. 

14. Philip J. Baines, "The Prospects for ‘Non-Offensive' Defenses in Space," in New Challenges in 

Missile Proliferation, Missile Defense, and Space Security, ed. James Clay Moltz (Monterey: 

Center for Nonproliferation Studies Occasional Paper no. 12, Monterey Institute of International 

Studies, July 2003), 31–48. 

15. Kevin Pollpeter, Building for the Future: China's Progress in Space Technology during the 10th 5-

year Plan and the U.S. Response (Carlisle, PA: Strategic Studies Institute, U.S. Army War 

College, 2008), 48–50. 

16. Michael P. Pillsbury, "An Assessment of China's Anti-Satellite and Space Warfare Programs, 

Policies, and Doctrines," report prepared for the U.S.-China Economic and Security Review 

Commission, January 19, 2007, 48. 

17. Bruce W. MacDonald, China, Space Weapons, and U.S. Security (New York: Council on Foreign 

Relations, September 2008), 34–38. 

18. Although article VII of the Outer Space Treaty discusses liability, that article was further 

implemented in the Convention on International Liability for Damage Caused by Space Objects, 

commonly referred to as the Liability Convention. Under the Liability Convention, article II, a 

launching state is absolutely liable to pay compensation for damage caused by its space object on 

the surface of the Earth or to aircraft in flight. However, under articles III and IV, in the event of 

damage being caused other than on the surface of the Earth by a space object, the launching state 

is liable only if the damage is due to its fault or the fault of persons for whom it is responsible (that 

is, commercial companies) under a negligence standard. Convention on International Liability for 

Damage Caused by Space Objects (resolution 2777 [XXVI] annex), adopted November 29, 1971, 

opened for signature March 29, 1972, and entered into force September 1, 1972. 

19. James Fallows, "The $1.4 Trillion Question," The Atlantic (January–February 2008). 

20. Peter Garretson, "Elements of a 21st-century Space Policy," The Space Review, August 3, 2009, 

available at <www.thespacereview.com/article/1433/1>. 

21. The January 1995 failure was a Long March 2E rocket carrying Hughes-built Apstar 2 spacecraft, 

and the February 1996 failure was a Long March 3B rocket carrying Space Systems/Loral-built 

Intelsat 708 spacecraft. Representative Christopher Cox (R–CA) led a 6-month long House Select 

Committee investigation that produced the "U.S. National Security and Military/Commercial 

Concerns with the People's Republic of China" report released on May 25, 1999 (available at 

<www.house.gov/coxreport>). In January 2002, Loral agreed to pay the U.S. Government $20 

million to settle the charges of the illegal technology transfer and in March 2003, Boeing agreed to 

pay $32 million for the role of Hughes (which Boeing acquired in 2000). Requirements for 

transferring controls back to the State Department are in Sections 1513 and 1516 of the Fiscal 

Year 1999 National Defense Authorization Act. Related items are defined as "satellite fuel, ground 

support equipment, test equipment, payload adapter or interface hardware, replacement parts, and 

non-embedded solid propellant orbit transfer engines." 

22. Satellite builders claim that their exports dropped 59 percent in 2000 and that since March 1999 

their share of the global market declined sharply (from 75 percent to 45 percent). Evelyn Iritani 

and Peter Pae, "U.S. Satellite Industry Reeling Under New Export Controls," The Los Angeles 

Times, December 11, 2000, 1. According to Space News, 2000 marked the first time that U.S. 

firms were awarded fewer contracts for geostationary communications satellites than their 

European competitors (the Europeans were ahead 15 to 13). Peter B. de Selding and Sam 

Silverstein, "Europe Bests U.S. in Satellite Contracts in 2000," Space News, January 15, 2001, 1, 

20. 
23. Peter B. de Selding, "European Satellite Component Maker Says it is Dropping U.S. Components 

Because of ITAR," Space News Business Report, June 13, 2005; and Douglas Barrie and Michael 

A. Taverna, "Specious Relationship," Aviation Week & Space Technology, July 17, 2006, 93–96. 

24. National Research Council, Beyond "Fortress America:" National Security Controls on Science 

and Technology in a Globalized World (Washington, DC: National Academies Press, 2009). With 

the new administration and Congress as well as former Congresswoman Ellen Tauscher confirmed 

in the key position of Under Secretary of State for Arms Control and International Security, 

conditions for changing the space export control law are the most favorable they have been for the 

last decade. 

25. Briefing of the Working Group on the Health of the U.S. Space Industrial Base and the Impact of 

Export Controls (Washington: Center for Strategic and International Studies, February 2008). 

26. Comprehensive and current information about orbital debris is provided by NASA and the 

European Space Agency at <www.orbitaldebris.jsc.nasa.gov> and 

<www.esa.int/esaMI/Space_Debris/ index.html>. 

27. "Fengyun 1–C Debris: Two Years Later," Orbital Debris Quarterly News 13, no. 1 (January 

2009), 2. As a result of the January 11, 2007, Chinese ASAT test, the U.S. Space Surveillance 

Network has catalogued 2,378 pieces of debris with diameters greater than 5 centimeters, is 

tracking 400 additional debris objects that are not yet catalogued, and estimates the test created 

more that 150,000 pieces of debris larger than 1 square centimeter. Unfortunately, less than 2 

percent of this debris has reentered the atmosphere so far and it is estimated that many pieces will 

remain in orbit for decades and some for more than a century. By contrast, destruction of the 

inoperative USA–193 satellite on February 21, 2008, occurred at a much lower altitude and did 

not produce long-lived debris; the last piece of catalogued debris from this intercept reentered on 

October 9, 2008. On the engagement of USA–193 see, in particular, James Oberg, "OPERATION 

BURNT FROST: Five Myths about the Satellite Smashup," NBC News Analysis, February 27, 

2008, and James E. Oberg, "Down in Flames: Media ‘Space Experts' Flub the Shoot-Down Story," 

The New Atlantis, no. 24 (Spring 2009), 120–129. 
Chapter 29:

Affordable and Responsive Space Systems

Martin Sweeting

This chapter discusses the principal issues influencing affordable and responsive space 

systems, and the application of low-cost, small satellites to the military and civil space 

domains. It establishes the proposition that small, affordable satellites will be employed 

mainly to extend space capabilities to regions of the "performance envelope" that large 

satellite systems simply cannot populate in an affordable fashion. It also discusses the 

technological advances that will provide opportunities to employ affordable systems in 

more traditional space application areas (such as strategic surveillance). 

The chapter commences with discussions of the military and civilian drivers that will 

influence the design of responsive space systems. It describes some of the desirable 

characteristics of responsive and affordable systems and the capabilities that they will 

offer to the warfighter. It then addresses specific design approaches that lead to 

affordable satellite systems that can be delivered in a responsive timeframe (since the 

development timescales are a facet of responsiveness just as much as the launch and 

operations). The concluding remarks consider the high-level issues that are likely to arise 

as space systems become increasingly responsive, with particular emphasis on the topic 

of space control. 

Military and Civil Drivers 

The concept of responsive space has been addressed mainly in the military domain, but 

there are analogous drivers in the civil domain that will also support the development of 

such systems in the future. Indeed, applications such as monitoring water and food 

resources are generally treated as civilian tasks at present, but it is widely believed that as 

population pressures increase in the next two decades, access to clean water and fertile 

land will increasingly become the catalyst for conflict. As a result, the need for timely 

surveillance will grow, and the line between military and civil monitoring will blur. 

In the military domain, since the conflict in Kuwait in 1991 (which has been described as 

the first space war), space has been recognized as the new high ground in military 

operations. The growing desire for the affordable and responsive space systems that are 

the subject of this chapter arises from the subsequent recognition that existing strategic 

space assets are relatively ill suited to supporting operational and tactical requirements. 

The procurement process for traditional space systems has for many years been in a 

negative spiral of increased costs, aversion to risk, long development timescales, and 

reduced numbers of launch opportunities. This stands in stark contrast to two of the 
principal drivers on the military today: reducing budgets and accelerating the tempo of 

operations to stay within an opponent's decision cycle. 

By contrast, small satellite systems are on a positive spiral of reducing costs, pragmatic 

risk management, short development timescales, and frequent launch opportunities. For 

these reasons, they can be used to address the future needs of warfighters in diverse 

locations around the globe. 

Other significant drivers in the military domain, all of which have implications for the 

design of affordable and responsive space systems, include: 

• a reluctance to put the lives of military personnel (on both sides) and civilians at 

risk. Military interest in capabilities such as unmanned surveillance platforms and 

precision weapons systems, utilizing high precision surveillance capability, is 

therefore on the increase. 

• an interest in employing network enabled technologies. The aim is to integrate the 

various elements of existing military capability, enhancing the efficiency of 

military campaigns and reducing the time for their completion. Improved 

communications capability, especially to mobile users, is central to this objective. 

• the desire to counter enemy camouflage, concealment, and deception techniques. 

The nature of the threat has changed, and military targets are generally becoming 

harder to distinguish. There is thus a significant reluctance to rely on a single 

surveillance capability, and indeed, the rules of engagement typically mandate 

target confirmation from a second sensor prior to engagement. Enemy awareness 

of satellite surveillance systems also leads to concealment operations during 

satellite passes. 

• the need for an effective Identification Friend or Foe (IFF) capability. The need to 

perform effective discrimination between friend and foe in a maneuver warfare 

environment in which the battle lines are far more fluid is a further driver for 

surveillance and communication systems. 

• the ability to conduct operations at extended range as the capabilities of weapons 

systems improve. With the advent of extremely capable surface-to-air missile 

systems and the proliferation of long-range ballistic weapons, the challenge to 

perform effective surveillance of regions deep within enemy territory from which 

a viable threat could nevertheless arise is becoming ever more acute. 

• a greater diversity of locations for potential conflict. Following the Cold War, the 

need for more agile forces capable of deployment to locations around the globe 

has increased. This includes the need to support more than one deployment in 

different locations on the globe at any given time. 

In the civil domain, much has been written concerning the National Aeronautics and 

Space Administration (NASA) mantra of "faster, better, cheaper." Improving space 

system performance simultaneously in all these areas has proved challenging (to say the 

least), but they remain three of the key performance metrics for any space system. 

Perhaps NASA's vision has been most closely approached in the realm of small satellites, 

where the scale of the systems makes it possible for them to be faster and cheaper, and 
where the use of modern commercial-off-the-shelf technologies has allowed them to 

close the performance gap on some of their larger cousins, which typically have much 

earlier "technology freeze dates." 

Among the principal civil drivers for responsive and affordable satellites systems are: 

• the push for newsworthiness. Despite the proliferation of satellites among many 

new space players in recent years, it is still comparatively rare to see satellite 

images in the news media. The reason is that the typical 2- to 3-day life of a news 

story represents a significant timeliness challenge to large space systems, where 

the access times to the region of interest are usually long, and the need for 

comparatively high-resolution imagery has until recently precluded the use of 

constellations of small satellites. 

• the goal of disaster mitigation. Some forms of natural disaster, such as hurricanes, 

can be tracked by existing space assets, but there are many others, such as 

earthquakes and floods, where timely access to warning data would be of extreme 

utility to the people attempting to respond to the crisis. As our understanding of 

the physical processes behind earthquakes improves, it may even be possible to 

use constellations of responsive spacecraft to move from disaster monitoring to 

disaster mitigation. 

• data continuity. Although the military has requirements for multiple surveillance 

data sets to perform short-term change detection, the need for data continuity in 

the civil domain is crucial to the maintenance of a wide variety of monitoring 

services. At the current time, for example, the Landsat community of users who 

are exploiting that system for long-term environmental modeling faces a potential 

data gap as the on-orbit assets reach the end of their lives. Here the driver is to 

find an affordable way to maintain access to data over long periods of time, but 

there is also a need to replace assets in a timely fashion should one of the existing 

sensors fail unexpectedly. Another element of responsiveness is the desire to 

monitor some phenomena at specific times of day or during particular seasons. 

With a limited number of space assets available, such monitoring becomes 

something of a statistical lottery. By contrast, responsive constellations provide 

sufficient collection opportunities to overcome the vagaries of the weather. 

• integrity and reliability. As we rely increasingly on space assets in a variety of 

subtle ways—for example, mobile phone networks and national power grids use 

the precision timing signal provided by global positioning systems (GPS) for 

switching coordination—it is important that our space systems can monitor their 

own state of health and respond accordingly if one of the elements in the system 

becomes unavailable for some reason. However, these high levels of integrity and 

reliability quickly become cost drivers unless significant levels of autonomy are 

included in the system. 

Characteristics of Responsive and Affordable Space Systems 

There is a pressing need to keep the costs associated with space systems to a minimum. 

The budgets available to the military have decreased in real terms since the end of the 
Cold War, but at the same time, the number of military tasks that satellites are able to 

support has grown significantly, to the point where effective military operations are now 

infeasible without the surveillance, communications, navigation, and meteorological 

capabilities provided from space. In the civil domain, it is becoming increasingly 

common for commercial organizations rather than governmental institutions to 

commission constellations of satellites. In the commercial domain, there is always a focus 

on providing a return to investors in the shortest possible time. In order to be responsive, 

future space systems will thus need to provide significantly greater capacity to meet this 

increasing demand. However, it is simply not feasible to proliferate large satellite systems 

to achieve this; the costs and timescales are prohibitive. It is thus axiomatic that to be 

affordable and responsive, future responsive space systems must be designed around 

constellations and clusters of small satellites. 

This process of evolution to multiple satellite systems has already begun. Examples in the

surveillance domain include the international Disaster Monitoring Constellation (DMC) 

and the forthcoming RapidEye constellation, both of which comprise five satellites in 

Sun-synchronous orbits. Even more numerous in terms of satellites are the low Earth

orbit (LEO) communication constellations, such as Orbcomm and Iridium; these are 

clearly starting to enter the realm of mass production, where the costs of the initial design 

can be amortized through the production of multiple platforms, thereby enhancing the 

affordability of the system as whole. The broad coverage offered by these systems leads 

to some of the most interesting possibilities for the future, with every likelihood that 

space systems will be used to support individual users/operators equipped with networkenabled Blackberry-class terminals (discussed in more detail below). 

Figure 29–1 illustrates the regions of the surveillance performance envelope that are 

occupied by different classes of satellite. Satellites for traditional Earth resources 

missions, such as Landsat and Spot, are large and expensive, are launched infrequently, 

and have 2-week orbital revisit cycles. It is a measure of the increasing capability of 

small satellites (which employ far more modern detector technology) that similar

resolutions can now be achieved with much smaller and cheaper space hardware. 

Uniquely, as a result of the lower costs associated with small satellites, they can be 

proliferated in constellations, such as DMC and RapidEye. As a result of having five 

satellites, these constellations offer daily global imaging capability, moving their 

performance envelope significantly lower in the diagram. By contrast, existing military 

satellites are located somewhere to the left of the red region representing the capabilities 

of commercial remote sensing satellites such as Quickbird and Ikonos. 

Figure 29–1. Revisit Period versus Spatial Resolution for Imaging Surveillance 

Satellites 
In the future, the operational and tactical requirements that drive the design of responsive 

satellite systems will be located near the bottom of the 1-meter (m) resolution line on this 

diagram; that is, the spatial resolutions required will be less exacting than for strategic 

intelligence assessments, but the data will need to be delivered in near real time. It is 

apparent that the journey from the existing capabilities to this target location on the 

diagram is far shorter, and hence far more feasible, for small satellites. 

This is just one example of the need for different metrics to measure the performance of 

responsive satellite systems. The increasing need to conduct operations at extended range 

means that area coverage rate, rather than spatial resolution, will be one of the primary 

performance metrics. The 600-square-kilometer (km) images generated by the wide area 

cameras on the first-generation DMC satellites are approximately 10 times the size of a 

comparable resolution Landsat image and take just 80 seconds to collect, rather than the 

weeks demanded by the Landsat orbit cycle. The pan-sharpened multispectral data 

available from the second-generation DMC satellites are arguably the best quality (4 m 

resolution) per dollar (a total mission cost of less than $20 million) of any satellite ever 

launched. 

The next generation of small surveillance satellites will offer even more interesting 

tradeoffs between resolution and area coverage by exploiting the agility of small satellite 

platforms. Because large satellites frequently have deployed appendages, such as solar 
arrays and antennas, settling time is required following maneuvers to allow the highest 

resolution imagery to be collected. By contrast, small satellites have relatively few 

dynamic modes and hence can be pitched and rolled to collect multiple images of a 

specific theater in a given pass. In consequence, 2–2.5 m resolution imagery over regions 

covering 60 km2 will be available before the end of the decade. 

For affordable space systems, the value-for-money metric is also of crucial importance. 

This metric is typically assessed by comparing the spatial resolution of the imagery 

provided by the system with the costs incurred in building and launching the satellite. It is 

also conventional to extend this performance metric to consider the value provided by the 

system as the total number of images at a given resolution over the satellite lifetime. This 

is a valid calculation, but it can be seen that attempting to maximize this particular 

measure of the value can sometimes come into opposition with the need for affordability 

and responsiveness. The value provided from a satellite in this case clearly increases if 

the lifetime is extended (since the satellite will have the opportunity to collect more 

imagery), but the costs associated with extending the satellite's lifetime (higher 

specification components, additional functional redundancy of the satellite hardware, far 

more extensive and time-consuming testing programs) can start to compromise the goal 

of affordability; that is, the value of the system increases, but the value for money is not 

necessarily enhanced because the costs also rise. The need for a more sophisticated 

approach becomes more apparent when the temporal aspects of the problem are 

considered—a complex satellite with a long design lifetime is a concept that stands in 

direct contrast to the responsiveness that is increasingly desired. As will be discussed, 

there are distinct advantages to designing "responsive" satellites with a 5- to 7-year 

lifetime. 

The need for greater accuracy to support precision-guided long-range weapons systems 

means that future responsive satellite systems also need to emphasize geolocation 

accuracy among their design criteria. In part, this can be achieved by improved orbit 

knowledge (on-board GPS receivers already deliver better orbit determinations than 

ground-based radars). In addition, the use of enhanced star cameras will permit attitude 

determinations to very high precision on the next generation of small satellites. These 

missions should thus be capable of providing geolocation values of better than 50 m 

without the need for ground control points. The agility of this generation of small 

satellites will also permit the collection of in-pass stereo data to further improve the 

quality of the geospatial information available from the system. A direct comparison with 

large satellite design helps to emphasize this point. Most large satellites cannot collect inpass stereo because they have large deployed antennas and solar panels, which are 

excited into dynamic modes by any maneuvering of the satellite. Hence, pitching a large 

satellite at the angular rates necessary to achieve a suitable stereo pair would lead to 

unacceptable perturbations of the sensor and seriously degraded image quality. One 

solution to this problem has been implemented on Spot 5, where the satellite carries two 

cameras, one pointed forward and one pointed aft, so that the satellite can collect two 

images without changing its attitude. Clearly, though, a small, agile satellite that can 

capture two images using a single camera makes a significant saving relative to this 

approach. 
Improving Future System Responsiveness 

The responsiveness of future systems can be improved in a number of ways, some of 

which are enumerated below. 

Orbital heights and inclinations. The satellite system can be designed to operate at a 

greater variety of orbital heights and inclinations. This has the advantage that, upon 

launch, an orbit can be chosen that maximizes the coverage of a particular theater of 

interest, wherever it is located on the globe. The increase in the number of passes per day 

potentially compensates for the reduction in the satellite's duty cycle that may result from 

having less than optimal power generation conditions. (However, note that an operational 

duty cycle as low as 2 percent per orbit will still be sufficient to provide coverage of most 

theaters of interest.) As the sizes of militarily relevant satellites reduce, it becomes 

increasingly feasible to envisage a flexible concept of operations in which the satellite is 

able to perform on-orbit maneuvers to establish a repeating ground trace. The advantage 

of such an orbital maneuver for a surveillance satellite is that the imaging geometry 

generally can be duplicated on successive days, with the result that relatively 

straightforward (and hence timely) change-detection algorithms can be applied to extract 

the relevant military information from the raw data. 

It is also interesting to consider the extent to which lower orbits (traditionally avoided by 

long-lived satellites since the propellant loads become prohibitive) can be exploited by 

satellite systems that have shorter design lives. This potential extension into the near 

space domain can offer higher resolutions (the sensor is closer to a target at nadir); 

improved sensitivity/signal to noise ratios (for the same reason); and, surprisingly, greater 

area coverage rates (for a sensor with a maximum slant range of operation, the 

instantaneously accessible region on the surface of the Earth actually increases if the 

satellite flies at a lower altitude). 

Time of operation. The system can be designed to operate at different local times of day. 

Many surveillance systems are constrained by lighting or power considerations to operate 

in specific orbits, from which they provide coverage at particular times of day. This not 

only limits the operational flexibility of allied commanders, but also introduces a degree 

of predictability that an opponent can exploit to avoid being detected. The agility of small 

optical surveillance satellites can be exploited in the form of a pitching motion that 

reduces the effective ground speed of the satellite's sensor, as demonstrated by the current 

TopSat mission. The effect of this pitching motion is that more light enters the camera, 

producing a better quality image. It follows, therefore, that by increasing the pitching 

rate, more ground-motion compensation is possible. Enough light can then be collected to 

generate usable imagery even when the satellite is comparatively close to the terminator. 

Optical surveillance is thus freed from its traditional time slots either side of local noon 

and (with some caveats) is also freed from its traditional dependence (in the West at 

least) on Sun-synchronous orbits. Orbits that are not Sun-synchronous will pass over 

specific locations on the ground at different times of day. This lack of predictability in 

terms of orbital pass times will make it more difficult for an opponent to implement 

concealment measures, a difficulty that will be compounded as satellites become smaller 
and thus more difficult to track. Again, the agility of small satellites can be seen to be 

delivering capabilities that large satellites would find it extremely difficult to match. 

Adding intersatellite links. Current LEO communications systems include Iridium, which 

is equipped with intersatellite links (ISLs) to expedite the delivery of messages within the 

system. Iridium allows communications with much smaller mobile terminals on the 

ground, but it is also possible to envisage using systems of this sort to communicate with 

other satellites in LEO. In the near future, satellites equipped with ISLs are anticipated to 

be permanently in contact with their control stations for the purposes of receiving thinroute command data. Some existing LEO surveillance assets are equipped with complex 

low Earth/geosynchronous orbit links via broadband data relay satellites to allow them to 

return their data in near real time. At present, the data volumes that can be supported by 

the LEO communications networks are insufficient to allow imagery data to be passed in 

a responsive timeframe, but future data delivery concepts, such as the Cascade satellite 

program, may allow this. 

Onboard processing. Exploiting the rapid development of miniaturized, high-capacity 

terrestrial processors, small satellites are increasingly able to outperform their much 

larger cousins in terms of onboard processing. As an example, the 6.5-kilogram Snap-1 

nanosatellite launched in 2000 had twice the processing capability of the entire 8-ton 

Envisat platform that was launched in 2003. This ability to exploit novel technologies 

means that small satellites will increasingly be able to preprocess their data and return 

their information at a much reduced data rate, either via the LEO communications 

networks or to transportable, in-theater command and data reception terminals. 

In-theater control. Placing the command authority in the theater of operations will 

significantly improve the responsiveness of the system to the commander's needs. 

Networking such capabilities through a network-centric architecture has already been 

demonstrated by the Virtual Mission Operations Centre experiment, in which a router 

carried by the United Kingdom's DMC satellite was used to create an in-orbit point of 

presence on the Internet that is able to respond to requests for imagery data from the 

satellite's memory. At present, the logistical impact of in-theater payload control and data 

reception is that a 2.5-meter-diameter tracking dish needs to be fielded, alongside a 

vehicle equipped with the processing capabilities to turn the raw data into exploitable 

imagery. The United Kingdom's TopSat mission has already demonstrated the feasibility 

of in-theater data reception direct from the satellite on the same pass that the imagery was 

collected. Future experiments are planned with TopSat that will additionally demonstrate 

the ability to command the satellite on the same pass as the planned imagery collection, 

with the result that the tasking, collection, and processing elements of the imagery 

intelligence process can be completed in less than 15 minutes. 

In the future, technological developments—including greater satellite power generation 

capacities achieved through improved solar cell design, better use of satellite power 

resources through the employment of intelligent, steerable antennas, improved on-board 

processing, enhanced coding schemes, and improved ground terminal designs derived 

from mobile phone technologies—will significantly reduce the logistical impact on the 
ground stations, to the extent that a relatively noncooperative handset, potentially 

comparable to an Iridium mobile phone, will be all that is required to interact effectively 

with the space segment. These technical improvements should also help to address one of 

the other military drivers discussed earlier: the need for more effective IFF capabilities to 

protect troops at all levels of command, some of which would otherwise find it difficult 

to carry terminals with adequate performance to interact reliably with a satellite. 

Sensor diversification . The speed with which a target of interest will be detected and 

discriminated from friendly forces will depend on the range of sensors that can be 

brought to bear on the task. In the past, the lack of coordination between different sensor 

systems (imagery and signals intelligence, for example) has made the fusion of their data 

difficult, if not impossible. In the future, responsive constellations of multiple satellites 

will greatly enhance the number of opportunities to collect collocated, contemporaneous 

surveillance data, and so address the problems posed by camouflage, concealment, and 

deception, and IFF. This may be implemented on multicapability missions (such as 

TACSAT–2) or on cooperative constellations of satellites with single sensing systems. 

The range of fusion techniques that can be applied will be further enhanced by the variety 

of surveillance modes on offer from future sensors. Hyperspectral imagers and synthetic 

aperture radar (SAR) instruments are responsive in the sense that they can vary their 

number of sensing bands, spatial resolutions, and surveillance footprints in order to tailor 

their collection to the intelligence task at hand. The compact hyperspectral imaging 

spectrometer instrument carried by the Proba satellite has already demonstrated some of 

this flexibility in the hyperspectral arena, and multimode, multi-polarimetric SAR 

collection is the objective of the United Kingdom's proposed AstroSAR satellite. 

Clearly, this move toward active sensing using small satellite radars will progressively 

escape the constraints of lighting conditions and cloud cover, which will forever limit the 

responsiveness of optical surveillance assets. However, the performance of an optical 

sensing system depends in no small part on the extent to which it can be provided with 

cueing information about cloud cover. In a sparse network consisting of just a few 

surveillance assets, only limited near-real-time information is available to target the 

collection through the gaps in the cloud cover. A more densely populated constellation of 

satellites potentially can be used much more efficiently if the data from one satellite can 

be exploited in a timely fashion to update the commanding for the next asset that will 

make a pass over the theater of interest. 

A further advantage of having multiple sensors that are capable of viewing a region 

simultaneously is the increased possibility of novel sensing techniques. In the 

hyperspectral domain, for example, the power of such sensors to discriminate different 

materials on the ground depends in part on the ability to measure the bidirectional 

reflectance distribution function (BRDF), which is essentially the extent to which the 

color of a surface changes depending on the angle between the direction of illumination 

and the direction of the sensor. A small, agile satellite can potentially make a number of 

samples of the BRDF as it passes over a target, but these are necessarily separated 

somewhat in time. An even more attractive and responsive possibility is that a number of 

satellites with similar sensors could be trained on a given target at the same time to get an 
immediate readout of its BRDF, since this would allow instantaneous measurements of 

the signatures of moving targets as well as static ones. It is hard to imagine large satellites 

that are either agile enough or cheap enough to be proliferated sufficiently to match these 

capabilities. 

Radar satellites also offer a greater range of sensing mechanisms when used 

collaboratively. Traditional monostatic imagery collection can be enhanced by bistatic 

collection modes, and the simultaneous collection of multipolar imagery can further 

enhance the discrimination capabilities of the system if required. The range of different 

illumination angles available from a constellation reduces the impact of "radar shadows" 

that would otherwise affect the responsiveness of the system (since, to be useful, the 

imagery products need to include data on a significant percentage of the terrain below). 

As an example, terrain information can be generated by two radar satellites working in 

tandem using inverse synthetic aperture processing techniques. The digital terrain 

elevation data products resulting from this process must include a high percentage of the 

terrain in order to meet the established criteria for such products. Terrain shadowing often 

prohibits this level of coverage from a single imaging pass, resulting in the need for 

several orbital passes at different geometries in order to build up a suitable mosaic. The 

problem of terrain shadowing becomes even more acute in the case of moving target 

information (MTI) systems. In hilly terrain, the areas most likely to be shadowed are 

those at the bottoms of valleys. For practical reasons, most of the lines of communication 

(roads, railways, and rivers), and hence most of the moving targets of interest, are also at 

the bottoms of valleys. This statistical bias is likely to make MTI ineffective unless a 

constellation of assets providing a range of surveillance geometries is available. 

Some of the examples discussed above assume the use of small satellites operating in 

widely separated constellations, where the timeliness and responsiveness of the system on 

a global basis will be maximized by distributing the passes of the satellites in time. Some 

of the later examples of simultaneous multiple-satellite coverage assume the use of 

formation-flying techniques, where the assets are operated in a cluster, providing 

contemporaneous coverage of a specific region of interest. Assuming that at least some of 

the satellites in a constellation operate in common orbital planes, it is possible to envisage 

a situation in which relatively small propulsive maneuvers could reconfigure a 

"constellation" into a formation-flying "cluster" over a period of time via in-plane 

velocity changes. This is a higher, system-level aspect of responsiveness that will allow 

space systems to be configured most appropriately for the military tasks at hand. 

When configured as a cluster, the elements of a satellite system can operate in a 

comparatively independent fashion to generate data sets that can later be combined. It is, 

however, also possible to envisage clusters of satellites with the ability to combine their 

data interferometrically, and thus create a sparse aperture that could synthesize the 

capabilities of much larger satellites. In order to preserve the signal phase information 

required to achieve this, the intersatellite links would need to provide not only the 

relatively coarse positional information required to maintain acceptable baselines 

between the satellites, but also the much finer metrology necessary to measure the 

intersatellite separations to small fractions (perhaps 10 percent) of the operational 
wavelength of the system. In the near term, this implies that such systems will be 

constrained to operate at radio and microwave frequencies, but the long-term ambition 

would be to create clusters of satellites that could avoid the expense of having to launch a 

satellite with a massive, deployable instrument. 

In response to a future conflict scenario, the operation of a cluster of orbiting assets could 

be varied progressively depending on the user need. A cluster of assets operating as an 

interferometer over comparatively small regions on the ground (to generate highresolution imagery, for instance) could be switched almost immediately to more 

independent modes covering somewhat larger regions within the same theater (for 

example, using the separate apertures within a cluster to collect data on a given region 

sequentially, rather than simultaneously, for change detection purposes), and could then 

be maneuvered physically around their orbit plane to change the pattern of passes over 

the theater to maximize the area coverage rate and timeliness of revisit. Physical 

reconfigurations offer the additional advantage that an opponent will find it harder to 

predict surveillance overflights and hence will have more difficulty implementing 

countersurveillance operations. 

Achieving Responsive and Affordable Capabilities 

To provide the most cost-effective, responsive space capabilities, there is a need to 

change procurement strategies to exploit terrestrial technologies, which now often exceed 

military capabilities. Following World War II, the Western militaries had access to the 

highest technology levels across a wide range of disciplines. The huge sums of research 

money now being invested by commercial industry in areas such as telecommunications, 

computing, cameras, and so forth mean that, in these areas especially, the former military 

supremacy is no longer the case. 

Experience with small satellites suggests that some very specific techniques can be 

implemented to exploit novel technologies and thus increase both affordability and 

responsiveness. 

Modular design. A standardized approach to the design of core satellite elements such as 

electronics trays allows specific elements to be incorporated in the design with a 

minimum of overhead. 

Maximize use of heritage hardware. In small satellite design, in order to keep costs down, 

it is generally considered good practice to ignore blank sheets of paper. It is also 

inadvisable to use lists of components that have been designed before. The approved 

approach is to use a change management process to adapt an existing design for a new 

mission. This approach can also be used for software to keep the launch and early orbit 

phase shorter. 

Evolve capability using experiments. An approach that has been successfully employed 

over a series of satellite missions is to fly experiments in orbit to prove their viability 

before baselining them for operational missions. A current example is the GPS 
reflectometry experiment flying on the DMC satellite, where GPS satellite signals that 

have been reflected into space by the ocean surface are collected by an orbiting receiver. 

In the process of reflection, the GPS signals are modulated by the waves. By comparing 

the reflected signal with the direct-path original, it is possible to derive information on 

the prevailing sea state. 

Design for launch on any vehicle. Having a satellite design that will withstand the loads 

imposed by any launch vehicle avoids potential delays due to launch vehicle failures 

(potentially imposing a program hiatus while the problem is resolved or while the 

satellite is redesigned for an alternative launch platform). This approach allows design 

effort to be concentrated on elements of mission that are unique. Satellites will thus not 

be mass-optimized, but rather time- and cost-optimized. 

Selecting appropriate technologies . Some terrestrial technologies are more suitable than 

others for exploitation in space. For example, the use of a controller area network to link 

the various components of a satellite can be seen as an appropriate choice when it is 

recalled that this technology was developed for use in the automobile industry, where the 

temperature and vibration environment is extreme. When considering placing a 

technology on a rocket and launching it into a vacuum, it is clearly desirable if it comes 

"pre-ruggedized." 

Avoid requirements creep . The most responsive approach normally is to work with a 

customer in advance to agree on satellite design specifications (sometimes accepting 

slightly lower performance for a major discount on cost), and then sign a fixed-price 

contract—a major disincentive to requirements creep and contract change notices. 

Satellite builders have to learn to "just say no" when design modifications are mooted. 

Mass produce . As in any other branch of manufacturing, there are significant cost 

savings to be made through mass production. In the case of the automobile industry, more 

than 99 percent of the prototype costs can be saved via the implementation of a mass 

production process. It is unrealistic to assume that figures as optimistic as this would be 

possible for space in the short term, but the successes of the Russian space program over 

an extended period would appear to be largely based on long production runs of 

essentially identical satellites, which kept the costs to an affordable level. 

Automate. A significant component of any mission's costs is operations. This is an area 

where responsiveness and affordability can be competing drivers, but it remains a major 

advantage to take the human out of the loop wherever possible. This is only partly 

because computers are cheaper to employ. They are also able to perform calculations 

faster than human beings and, if programmed correctly, do not make the sort of errors 

that can add delays and costs to a program. 

Conclusion 

Small satellite systems now have the ability to provide affordable support in the 

responsive timescales associated with the operational military domain, with the result that 
military planners (especially in the United States) view space as the new military high 

ground. As small satellites provide this operational support, they will increasingly 

become targets for hostile enemy action, causing space situation awareness and the 

control of space to move up the agenda of military priorities. Responsive satellite assets 

have a role to play in creating the "recognized space picture" that will underpin all 

military operations in the future. 

Improved affordability means that military space capabilities based on small satellite 

systems will continue to spread to a variety of nations that have not previously had access 

to such systems. While these systems will not match the performance levels of large 

satellites in terms of spatial resolution, they will offer a degree of timeliness and 

responsiveness that will level the playing field to some degree. 

It is likely that this expansion of capabilities will extend into the radar remote sensing 

domain, with the result that the National Reconnaissance Office assertion, "We own the 

night," will be challenged. Previously, this would have required access to a very capable 

launch system, as well as significant radar satellite hardware, but the change in scale of 

the on-orbit hardware will diversify the available launch options, and the use of 

commercially available terrestrial technologies that can be sourced from anywhere on the 

globe means that export controls are likely to prove ineffective. It is thus unrealistic to 

suppose that it will be possible to prevent the deployment of novel in-orbit capabilities. 

Increasingly, the opportunities for satellites to collaborate in multinational constellations, 

such as DMC, will make the ownership of certain capabilities a more complex issue. For 

example, it is clear who owns each of the individual satellites in the DMC constellation, 

but the emergent responsiveness of the constellation as a whole is "owned" by a 

multinational consortium. It is not difficult to imagine circumstances where such 

multinational arrangements could be compromised by political considerations in the 

future. Increasingly, though, the advantages of such international constellations will be 

perceived not only by the satellite owners, but also by the other nations that benefit from 

their existence. (For example, although not a part of the DMC constellation, the United 

States was supplied with wide-area disaster relief imagery by Nigeria in the wake of 

Hurricane Katrina.) In this sense, satellites become a form of public good, and decisions 

on space control operations will need to be influenced by the potential costs associated 

with the denial of capability in certain circumstances. The recent proposal for a coalition 

operationally responsive space capability is thus widely regarded as the sharpest space 

idea to emerge from the United States this millennium. 

The U.S. navigation warfare strategy recognizes a similar issue by mandating that the 

various public good missions supported by the satellite assets will be unaffected outside 

the immediate theater of operations. If—as now appears likely following the successful 

launch of the first low-cost Galileo demonstrator satellite—the European equivalent of 

the GPS constellation can be implemented affordably, similar navigation warfare issues 

will arise. 
The desire to avoid collateral damage to uninvolved civilians means that, in some senses, 

the objective of exercising space control will require the ability to control not the whole 

of space, but specifically the region of space above and adjacent to the theater of 

operations. Clearly, this has implications for the systems that may be used to conduct 

surveillance of this localized region and for the ones that may subsequently utilize this 

localized surveillance information to exercise space control: both are likely to require an 

in-theater component. If some of the surveillance assets are in-theater, adequate secure 

communications will be required to convey their data to the locations in home territory 

from which the launches of any responsive space assets would presumably be 

coordinated. This would probably be true even if some of the launches themselves 

occurred from mobile platforms located in places that would either deliver an element of 

surprise to the enemy or allow easier access to orbits tailored to the particular theater of 

operations. (In the case of the United States, for example, sea-launch platforms located 

close to the Equator would allow greater payload masses to be delivered to low 

inclination orbits than would be possible using similar launch vehicles from fixed sites 

within the continental United States.) 

It should also be borne in mind that the space surveillance task, whether in-theater or not, 

is likely to become more challenging in the coming years. At present, all operational 

satellites are large enough to be tracked by the existing radar network, but "cubesats," 

with dimensions of about 10 centimeters, are already starting to push the limits of 

detectability. In the future, an increasing proportion of the on-orbit assets will be small 

responsive systems that present these sorts of problems to the tracking networks. 

(Incidentally, the risk here is not simply that an enemy might deploy undetectably small 

platforms, but also that maintaining knowledge of small responsive allied assets will 

become harder for the traditional sensors.) But it is not just size that is the problem. In the 

future, the sort of stealth technologies that have been applied to aircraft and other military 

platforms inevitably will also be applied to satellites, reducing their signatures and 

making them harder to see. Clearly, though, small, responsive satellites start out with an 

advantage in the stealth arena in the sense that their signatures are smaller. 

The space situation awareness task will be further complicated by the proliferation of 

assets that are likely to be launched (in part to convey robustness through proliferation). 

This will be especially true in time of crisis (in a responsive, constellation-dominated 

future, there will simply be more satellites to detect, characterize, and track). Responsive 

systems also require a responsive concept of operations, a consequence of which is that 

satellites are likely to maneuver frequently, either to optimize their number of passes over 

a theater; to create specific viewing geometries; or to make it harder for enemy forces to 

target counterspace operations against them. In the last of these instances, it is axiomatic 

that such maneuvers would take place out of sight of the opposing forces, such that the 

satellite would make its next transit over the theater on a novel trajectory. This 

emphasizes the need for robust in-theater tracking capabilities, especially since there is an 

element of statistical uncertainty in all satellite maneuvers. A satellite's postmaneuver 

orbit may successfully confuse the opposition, but for its subsequent passes to be used 

effectively, its new orbit will need to be determined quickly by its owners, as small 
timing errors can lead to large miss distances at orbital velocities close to 7.5 kilometers 

per second. 

The opportunity cost associated with having responsive satellites on hand awaiting 

launch is only viable if costs are very low and launches are frequent. In the small satellite 

domain particularly, satellite lifetimes are short because of rapid technology evolution. 

Just as for personal computers, 5 years is the typical "obsolescence timeframe" for a 

small satellite, since at this point its performance will be superseded by new technologies. 

It is thus not a viable strategy to use up a significant fraction of this lifetime with the 

satellite hardware on the ground. A more credible approach would appear to be to design 

satellites with a flexible concept of operations, allowing the configuration of the 

constellations and clusters to be modified on-orbit in response to changing situations on 

the ground. 

If small satellites are "the PCs of space," then the interconnection of small satellites using 

intersatellite links (initially exploiting the existing LEO mobile communications 

networks) will create a responsive and affordable "space Internet" offering a wide range 

of exciting possibilities and emergent capabilities. The protection of this multiply 

interlinked, international network could become one of the highest priorities for any 

space control system in the future. 

The contributions that various nations make to this international network will be one 

dimension of the soft power projection that they will be able to exercise in this 

timeframe. In light of the stated aspirations of China to launch more than 100 small 

satellites over the next decade or so, producing affordable and responsive space systems 

may not be something the West chooses to do in order to create an advantage and exert 

influence in the future, but rather something that it needs to do simply to maintain parity. 
Chapter 30:

Future Strategy and Professional Development: A Roadmap

Simon P. Worden

Once upon a time there was a dear little chicken named Chicken Little. One morning as 

she was scratching in her garden, a pebble fell off the roof and hit her on the head. "Oh, 

dear me!" she cried, "The sky is falling. I must go and tell the King," and away she ran 

down the road. 

The fable of Chicken Little has many versions. In some, she is saved by the King or 

another altruistic entity. In most, she and her colleagues are eaten by the evil Foxy Loxy. 

In my fable, however, the sky is not falling on Chicken Little—but that sky is receding at 

an ever increasing pace. 

In the 1980s and 1990s, space capabilities, and in particular their security-related aspects, 

were all the rage. In the 1980s, the United States was mounting a major missile defense 

program based largely on space capabilities. The Strategic Defense Initiative promised to 

lead to the end of the Cold War, and many experts believe it did. Our civil space program 

was beginning to fly the space shuttle, a reusable space transportation system that was 

heralded as ushering in a new era of space access and expansion. In the 1990s, 

commercial space programs such as the global space communications system Iridium 

were touted as the first step toward explosive growth for commercial space endeavors. 

Perhaps most significant was the apparent realization of the central role that space would 

play in national security. The bipartisan 1999 Commission to Assess National Security 

Space Management and Organization (the Rumsfeld Commission, named after its 

chairman, Donald Rumsfeld) resulted in huge growth in national security space spending 

and sweeping reorganization and centralization of national security space endeavors.1 

Alas, none of the ambitious prospects for space appear to have been met. Our missile 

defense systems have little to do with space capabilities; indeed, the entire program has 

effectively been transferred to the U.S. Army's ground-oriented management. The space 

shuttle has not met its promise and is being phased out in favor of the older Apollo 

approach. Most communications systems now rely on global fiber connections and not 

commercial space capabilities. And practically all of the Rumsfeld Commission's space 

recommendations have been abandoned. 

Of growing concern is what is going on outside the United States. Several states have 

expressed alarm over an alleged U.S. space weapons program. While these nations, 

particularly China and Russia, know that little is going on in this area, they have enjoyed 

stirring up international outrage for their own purposes. While this may seem harmless 

enough in the short term, it could itself be an impetus or perhaps an excuse for others to 
mount a counterspace effort of their own. In the past, such challenges to U.S. space 

utilization might have seemed laughable, but that is not so today. 

Many nations are mounting impressive programs in space technology and utilization. Key 

to these efforts has been the development of so-called microsatellites and low-cost means 

of getting them into space. The pioneer in this technology has been Surrey Satellite 

Technology, Ltd. (SSTL) at the University of Surrey.2 Part of SSTL's success has been its 

programs to assist other nations develop small (100-kilogram-class) space systems. Over 

a dozen nations have benefited from SSTL collaborations. Today, for less than $20 

million, just about any nation can build and launch a satellite capable of significant 

security-related functions such as 1-meter-class imagery. 

While the rest of the world aggressively develops these low-cost systems, the United 

States is increasingly mired in cost overruns and failed space systems. Practically every 

major U.S. security-related system is grossly overrun and significantly behind schedule. 

Moreover, with some exceptions (mostly driven by congressional insistence), the U.S. 

security community has shown little interest in small, fast-paced space systems. 

Part of the U.S. malaise stems from rather uninspired leadership in military space system 

development and operation. Most military space discussions begin with something along 

the lines of "support to the war fighter." This attitude has led to the perspective that space 

capabilities, and correspondingly military space leaders, are secondary to "warfighters." 

The U.S. Air Force highlights its combat pilots, not its space engineers. This is not the 

type of environment that will attract aggressive, creative leaders.3 The first premise of this 

chapter is that the primary value of space capabilities is not their support to warfighters; 

rather, it is that they are the primary means for war prevention through the forging of 

collaborative international security arrangements. 

Interestingly, SSTL has developed an impressive prototype for future use of space 

systems for security purposes: cooperative international space security measures based on 

small satellites. The SSTL-inspired and -led Disaster Monitoring Constellation consists 

of five microsatellites built and launched by Algeria, China, Nigeria, Turkey, and the 

United Kingdom.4 Each satellite obtains wide-area 36-meter imagery with planned 

improvements to 4-meter resolution. The member states get frequent revisit imagery 

suitable for detecting and managing responses to natural disasters such as floods and 

earthquakes. Key for the purposes of this discussion is the postulate that such systems 

represent a broader meaning of security and a new means to link diverse states in a 

common security endeavor. The United States would do well to learn from this success 

and find ways to involve itself in and lead such future cooperative ventures. 

One such possibility for cooperative international leverage is the new U.S. "Vision for 

Space Exploration." As with the Apollo program of the 1960s, the new space exploration 

initiative, involving the goal of permanent international settlements on other worlds, has 

considerable security-related possibilities. 
Significantly, space capabilities such as precision positioning, navigation, and timing 

through such systems as the global positioning system (GPS) have become true global 

utilities. Protecting and expanding these capabilities, which are critical elements in global 

economic lynchpins such as transportation and communication, are in the global interest. 

A new security regime based on shared global utilities, including long-term goals such as 

space exploration and settlement, offers the United States a new opportunity to lead 

international security regimes. Aggressive U.S. development of technology—for 

example, distributed small space systems such as microsatellites—is key. 

The Problem 

Foreign Progress 

The United States prides itself on its space leadership, particularly in the security use of 

space. Indeed, it regards space as critical to its overall national security stature. The 

National Space Policy reiterates this importance when it states, "United States national 

security is critically dependent upon space capabilities, and this dependence will grow."5 

The United States also recognizes that its space stature is being challenged by many 

nations. The Rumsfeld Commission noted: 

The relative dependence of the U.S. on space makes its space systems 

potentially attractive targets. Many foreign nations and non-state entities 

are pursuing space-related activities. Those hostile to the U.S. possess, or 

can acquire on the global market, the means to deny, disrupt or destroy 

U.S. space systems by attacking satellites in space, communications links 

to and from the ground or ground stations that command the satellites and 

process their data. Therefore, the U.S. must develop and maintain 

intelligence collection capabilities and an analysis approach that will 

enable it to better understand the intentions and motivations as well as the 

capabilities of potentially hostile states and entities.6 

This concern is translated in many minds, particularly those of national security space 

professionals, as a direct military challenge. However it does not appear that direct 

threats are the only, or perhaps even the most severe, ones. 

Many nations are developing significant dual-use capabilities that meet both security and 

other, often commercial and scientific, purposes. Other nations frequently have a broader 

view of security than just military concerns, to include economic and environmental 

aspects. Particularly within Europe, perspectives about military space are both uncertain 

and rapidly changing. In the multipolar world that emerged after the Cold War, security 

issues that were originally military driven have become more complicated. As European 

roles in the world grow, particularly peacekeeping roles outside the continent, the need 

for space system support in such areas as communications and navigation also grows. 
The emerging technology of small, low-cost space systems (micro-satellites) is changing 

the dynamic. Microsatellites are 100-to 200-kilogram systems that cost approximately $5 

million to $20 million to construct. Coupled with low-cost space launch, generally 

provided as a piggyback payload on a larger booster, the entire mission cost is $10 

million to $30 million—an order of magnitude less costly than conventional space 

missions. Using new off-the-shelf technology, these microsatellites can perform many of 

the security-related functions that formerly required large, expensive systems. For 

example, several nations are now producing microsatellites with 1-meter imagery 

resolution and significant signals intelligence functions. SSTL, a world leader in 

developing this capability, has led a global revolution in using the new, more affordable 

technology not only in Europe but also around the world. While microsatellites probably 

will not totally supplant large space systems, they can certainly perform many functions 

currently done by such large systems and could work in concert with them to provide 

extended capabilities—particularly in the context of shared international constellations 

such as the Disaster Monitoring Constellation. 

The trend toward smaller, more affordable space capabilities has enabled European 

nations and others to produce significant security capabilities within individual nations' 

space budgets. Examples of this approach are embodied in the German Synthetic 

Aperture Radar (SAR)– Lupe imaging satellite system and others now under 

development.7 The proliferation of this new national capability offers a new set of 

opportunities for use of space systems in security modes. 

The U.S. challenge in space is more than a strictly military one. The use of smaller, lower 

cost systems for a series of dual-use purposes is the real challenge. Meeting it will require 

a change in both the mindset of our security professionals as well as in technological 

direction—toward small, affordable dual-use systems with direct applicability to 

economic and environmental security as well as collective security. 

Nowhere is the trend toward small, internationally available capabilities more noticeable 

than in high resolution imaging and synthetic aperture radar systems. Most new efforts 

(see figure 30–1) are non-U.S. and/or wholly commercial endeavors. The U.S. national 

security community clearly no longer has a monopoly or even a lead role in this 

important area. 

U.S.Failures 

The U.S. security community's recent track record compares unfavorably to the 

impressive work being done internationally. The American focus on large, complicated 

systems may have been well founded in the Cold War, but in light of the rest of the 

world's success in smaller, more affordable space systems, the wisdom of maintaining 

this direction is dubious. More to the point, the United States is increasingly unable to 

even field these large systems.

Figure 30–1. Timetable: High Resolution and Synthetic Aperture Radar Satellites
In the 1970s, the U.S. Air Force launched the world's first comprehensive missile 

warning program, the Defense Support Program. These satellites carry infrared sensors 

that see the heat of a missile launch. In the 1980s, the United States began developing a 

follow-on system, now named the Space-based Infra-red System (SBIRS), which was 

intended to replace the Defense Support Program missile warning satellites with more 

capable and sensitive sensors. It was also intended to support comprehensive missile 

defenses. The first SBIRS satellites were to be launched in the early 1990s. Today, after 

at least a $20 billion expenditure, we are years away from a working system.8 Moreover, 

SBIRS is no longer capable of supporting comprehensive missile defenses, and the 

system is by no means the exception. Other major programs, such as next-generation 

weather satellites (the National Polar-orbiting Operational Environmental Satellite 

System [NPOESS]), are seriously behind schedule and considerably overrun.9 

Congress is increasingly critical of the U.S. national security community and has insisted 

that it pay more attention to small, low-cost "responsive" space systems. The responsive 

feature is the ability to respond to crises inside an adversary's act-react cycle as well as 

being a more effective response to direct military threats. The ability to quickly replace a 

lost space capability might prove a much better deterrent to foreign space military 

challenges than various forms of active space control, particularly when most potential 

adversaries have little reliance on space capabilities themselves. 
Congress has now mandated an Operationally Responsive Space program. Its rationale is 

impeccable. Consider the statement by Terry Everett (R–AL), chairman of the House 

Strategic Forces Subcommittee: 

We must also embrace innovative ways to advance our strategic enterprise. One 

innovative approach to getting key space capabilities into the hands of our military forces 

is Operationally Responsive Space (O-R-S). O-R-S is an effort to develop smaller, less 

expensive satellites that can launch on short notice to meet the immediate needs of the 

warfighter. 

In this year's [2006] defense bill, Congress created a joint O-R-S program office, bringing 

together: Science and technology; Acquisition; Operations; and Warfighter support. With 

this effort, I see a stronger national security space portfolio where O-R-S systems 

complement large traditional space programs. 

For this Office to be successful it must retain a strong joint core, bringing together leaders 

and participants from across the Services, Agencies, research labs, and industry. It must 

also create an environment that expects and rewards innovation. 

I said earlier that the strain of rising costs and affordability will continue to put pressure 

on our space and defense programs. At the same time, technologies are evolving at much 

higher rates than our current ten-plus year acquisition timelines. Therefore, I see two key 

thrusts to O-R-S: First, it is a means to get simple, low cost solutions rapidly on-orbit to 

meet the dynamic needs of our combatant commanders; Secondly, it provides more 

frequent opportunities to prove-out innovative concepts and technologies at a lower cost, 

while strengthening our industrial base and technical workforce. I've said low-cost twice. 

I can't emphasize this enough; we must control the costs of our space programs.10 

The national security space community's internal problems stem largely from a variety of 

"red herring" excuses for the community's shortcomings. As detailed in a paper by 

Randall Correll and this author, many excuses have been given, from masking symptoms 

for causes such as citing immature technologies and lack of good requirements definition, 

claiming insufficient system engineering expertise, poor cost analysis, shifting incumbent 

contractors, and others. The paper places the blames squarely on poor, often technically 

unqualified, leadership.11 

Our bad national security space posture stems from two major difficulties. First, we have 

not developed a coherent strategy, and second, we have developed neither a cadre of 

qualified experts to lead it nor the necessary space capabilities to support it. What follows 

is a prescription for remedying this, starting with a coherent strategy.12 

Coherent Security Space Strategy 

Progress in information technologies has completely reshaped the way humans 

communicate. The globalization of the economy and culture and the growing importance 

of worldwide information (such as the Internet) and human (such as al Qaeda) networks 
have changed relationships between not only people but also states from an exclusive to 

an inclusive paradigm. In this new era, it is often in the interest of all parties to cooperate 

with rather than oppose each other. This does not imply that competition has disappeared, 

but it has changed in nature, being more strongly related to confidence-building and 

"win-win" strategies. 

This new paradigm fits well with space capabilities that are inherently global in nature. 

Investments are often too costly for a single nation to make. The new developments in 

space capabilities may enable new security regimes. These possibilities generally come 

under the heading of soft power. The new options involve shaping the global 

environment to maximize collective security. They also entail changes in space policy on 

the part of various nations. Several approaches are possible in this direction. 

The world has entered an era of global utilities: capabilities, generally in the information 

collection and distribution regimes, that enable the emerging global economy, culture, 

and society. First among them is the Internet, followed closely by global positioning, 

navigation, and timing systems such as GPS and the European Galileo. Note that the GPS 

conceived in the 1980s remains exclusive to the U.S. Government, whereas Galileo is 

more collaborative, including major players outside of the European Union such as India 

and China. 

Other global utilities include global communications grids and global situation awareness 

such as imaging. New possibilities in this area include identification and tracking of 

moving objects such as aircraft. Many of these utilities grew out of military needs, but 

they have become the glue that holds the global economy and culture together. Almost all 

global utilities depend in some part on space capabilities. Even the Internet uses space 

systems for many of its long-range communications connections and precision timing. 

The breakdown of even one satellite can have devastating consequences to the global 

economy. In 1998, a failure of a single communications satellite carrying remote pager 

signals plunged much of North America into an unexpected business "holiday."13 

The first and possibly most potent element of soft power is inclusion in global utility 

services. Inclusion of a nation, group of nations, or even private concerns in the 

development of a global utility such as Galileo is a potent inducement for a desired 

behavior. Europe's experience with China and its inclusion in Galileo is a positive 

demonstration of this potential. Once connected by the utility, the parties have a strong 

mutual interest in protecting and advancing it. This provides a lever to bind and influence 

diverse interests. Finally, the possibility of being denied access to one or more global 

utilities in response to aggression by a state can be a compelling dissuasion from 

embarking on a hostile tack. Without global information support mechanisms, a nation 

would find its economy swiftly devastated. 

A related concept to global utilities is the rising importance of a global information 

connectivity or infosphere. The rise of a global information marketplace, largely 

originating in the Internet, is apparent. Although some of the explosive growth of the 

1990s has slowed, the Internet is still the fastest growing impetus to global commerce. 
Equally important is its role as a marketplace of ideas—a two-edged sword, as the 

Internet has become a medium through which modern terrorist groups recruit members 

and plan acts. Yet the global infosphere could also mean the end of narrow, 

fundamentalist ideologies. Modern terrorists do best recruiting among disillusioned and 

often isolated young individuals. These same individuals might have been recruited and 

organized through the Internet, but that same medium can and will also expose them to 

broader and more inclusive philosophies. 

A second element of future soft power is to connect the world into a global infosphere.

Again, confidence building is a key driver. Space capabilities are integral to this linkage 

to build cohesion and shared values as space communications segments are the only way 

to reach much of the developing world. Indeed, India's interest in space began as a way to 

link remote regions and foster development and education across the entire society. 

India's success in forming a coherent and rapidly developing nation out of diverse 

peoples and traditions can be partly attributed to building this space-based connectivity.14 

With the emergence of low-cost space capabilities such as those developed by SSTL, 

numerous nations can now afford space developments. However, one or even a handful 

of low Earth orbit satellites provides limited capability, whereas constellations of small 

satellites can provide significant capability. If a group of nations pools their efforts, each 

one providing a single satellite, all can benefit from a new space capability. The Disaster 

Monitoring Constellation discussed earlier is a prototype of such a multinational system. 

This cooperation represents a third approach to soft power—a means whereby smaller 

nations can pool capabilities to provide significant new space options. In the process of 

building the capability, the member nations also build technology interdependence and 

open new economic opportunities in other spheres. 

The concept of collective security is a longstanding one. During the Cold War, both 

competing blocs established collective security arrangements where an attack on one 

party would be met with a response from all. This was particularly effective for the North 

Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO); its collective defense arrangements kept the peace 

in Europe for almost half a century. Only with the end of the Cold War did conflict again 

break out on the European continent. Yet even with the disturbances in the former 

Yugoslavia, NATO's collective response has proven effective. Part of the key to 

collective security is in the pooling of defense resources, but even more important are the 

perception aspects of collective security arrangements. A potential aggressor must face 

the prospect of united defense against him. The psychological and societal impact of 

standing alone against united opposition is a significant factor in preventing war and 

aggression. A similar concept is especially applicable to global space security. 

Perhaps the most interesting aspect of cooperative international space development is its 

symbolic value as a pathfinder for other agendas. During the Cold War, space 

cooperation in the 1975 Apollo-Soyuz test project became a symbolic first in an attempt 

to lead to broader cooperation in arms control and other security and economic issues. 

The symbolic role of civil space cooperation truly blossomed in the International Space 

Station. Despite the political difficulties of building and maintaining such a complex 
space effort, its symbolic value to both governments and people has carried it through. It 

has been particularly valuable as a means whereby the United States and Russia have 

been able to divert technical expertise (particularly within Russia immediately after the 

end of the Cold War) from missile proliferation endeavors. In a similar vein, a European 

Community European Space Program is viewed by many as the path to broader European 

unity. Recently, the United States and India have used civil space cooperation as a step in 

building closer ties for united action against terrorism. With the major new U.S. push for 

human exploration of the Moon and Mars, cooperative programs in these areas could 

similarly prove to be effective vanguards for other agendas. 

This approach is not without its problems. Space technology is inherently dual-use, with 

advances in space providing new military possibilities. Moreover, space technology is 

often the impetus of and source for new economic products and markets, particularly in 

the important aerospace field. These considerations are particularly central to U.S. policy. 

A nation has the choice of ignoring other nations' space exploration interests, dominating 

mankind's expansion into the solar system, or cooperatively leading the world into the 

solar system. The United States has chosen the third option. Working to establish 

consensus on space exploration among numerous global partners could slow progress. 

However, an open space exploration architecture such as that advocated by Randall 

Correll and Nicolas Peter would allow nations to proceed at their own pace without 

sacrificing future opportunities for collaboration.15 

Space is an important component of global economic development. Space-reliant global 

utilities such as global positioning, communications, and situation awareness are critical 

to modern economic development. Communications connectivity is particularly 

important to remote regions. With new Ka band connectivity, high-speed Internet is 

available and affordable worldwide. Direct broadcast radio provided by such commercial 

concerns can bring education and information to even the most disadvantaged peoples. 

By offering these critical capabilities worldwide, a nation or group of nations will take a 

major step in providing the means for rapid economic development as well as building 

global cohesiveness. No element of soft power is more significant than the informationenabling aspect and its associated free exchange of information and ideas. 

Space information connectivity may be the key element in combating terrorism, which 

thrives in regions with little outside information and few economic opportunities. Global 

information connectivity is a powerful tool for combating both problems. The country of 

Jordan is a primary example of the power of a successful information strategy and its 

effect on terrorist activities. In the mid 1990s, Jordan embarked on an aggressive, private 

sector–oriented information and Internet connectivity campaign.16 Although still in 

progress, this campaign is succeeding in connecting schools, businesses, and publics 

nationwide. It is significant that terrorist attacks against U.S. targets in Jordan were met 

with wide public outrage there and strong support for Jordan's Western-oriented 

government. 

The first significant philosophical result of deep-space exploration in the 1960s was the 

view of the entire Earth as a small, interconnected entity. This global awareness 
continues today with new technology such as the Internet bringing the global perspective 

to each individual through such tools as Google Earth.17 Geospatial data is now accessible 

not only to top-level decisionmakers but also to media and the general public. Every 

citizen with Internet capability can now access and assess what is happening locally as 

well as globally. This global perspective will have a huge impact on governments and 

their decisionmaking. From it will emerge new influences on national policies: a new 

form of soft power. The National Aeronautics and Space Administration's collaboration 

with Google to include the Moon and Mars in the products of Google Earth is an example 

of how governments can work with private sector entities to further the new global 

perspective.18 These efforts should pay off not only in expanding space exploration but 

also in enhancing U.S. soft power influence. 

Over and above space exploration and space science, systems such as the international 

Disaster Monitoring Constellation and European Global Monitoring for Environment and 

Security are at the forefront of a different definition of security. The security aspects of 

collaborative efforts offer new opportunities to build soft power influence. By promoting 

a new strategy where space and associated global utilities function as the primary 

elements of our security posture rather than as support to warfighters, we could once 

again attract the best and brightest to space fields. 

Developing Leaders and Supporting Systems 

A major problem discussed by Correll and Worden is the lack of competent leadership 

for our national security space programs.19 There are a number of interconnected issues. 

First is the intensive requirements process, which has resulted in a cadre of "space 

professionals" whose expertise is in procurement rather than technical competence. This 

in turn has produced an aerospace industry dominated by those versed not in 

technological prowess but in meeting procurement regulations. Often, these corporate 

leaders are recently retired military leaders. The solution to this problem is to insist on 

technological competence as a prerequisite for leadership. 

Even a change of leadership toward technical excellence will accomplish little if the 

mindset of technical leaders is one of maintaining the status quo. In today's dynamic new 

industries such as information technology and biotechnology, growing attention has been 

paid to what is called disruptive technologies.

20 By paying slavish attention to 

customers—in the case of the national security space community, warfighters—many 

technologically oriented industries fail to recognize that a new technology that may not 

interest current customers could offer a way to develop a new, much larger client base. 

The new disruptive technologies for security space possibilities are small, responsive, 

information-oriented space systems. The new customers are practitioners of soft power 

information operations designed for war prevention and not warfighting. As with 

industries confronted with disruptive technologies, a separate organization that is 

chartered specifically to ignore current customers is needed. The space community does 

not have such an organization but desperately needs a disruptive technology development 

arm. 
A major problem is the aging of the aerospace workforce. With an average employee age 

of near 50 (as compared to an average age of under 30 during the Apollo era), the U.S. 

aerospace industry is in crisis. Moreover, there is significant evidence that neither 

industry nor government is able to replace the retiring infrastructure with comparable 

talent.21 This problem stems from a perception that aerospace technologies are yesterday's 

excitement, with much greater future potential in new areas such as bio- and 

nanotechnology. Moreover, with security space programs in the doldrums and little 

chance for advancement based on technical prowess, these programs and associated 

industries are unlikely to attract the top people. For the general aerospace industry, the 

new "Vision for Space Exploration," with its goal of settling the solar system, could 

provide a much-needed and exciting new perspective. A similar impetus would exist for 

security space endeavors with a new strategic purpose. However, to be convincing and 

sustainable, this new direction must be accompanied by a revised organizational 

structure. These three basic recommendations are expanded upon below. 

Technological Prowess 

Our problems begin with the requirements process mentality. The current acquisition 

approach grew out of Defense Secretary Robert McNamara's Planning, Programming, 

and Budgeting System of the 1960s. Since then, the defense community has built an 

enormous construct to develop requirements and budget for achieving them. Every time a 

new system fiasco occurs, a new review process and bureaucratic overlay are added. One 

such overlay occurred during the 1990s when the Office of the Joint Chiefs of Staff 

implemented a whole new process, the Joint Requirements Oversight Council. Carefully 

considering what a new system is supposed to do and what capabilities it must have, in 

itself, is advisable. However, the current process does not seem to do that. Most of the 

people staffing these requirements process offices have little technical, acquisition, or 

management experience. Few have the breadth of background and perspective to 

understand what is really needed and how it will be used. But each office can and does 

have the power to halt the process. Usually, a program is held up until every office is 

satisfied that its special interest item is included. Few have any idea of the feasibility of 

adding their demands, let alone the cost of doing so. There is supposed to be a process to 

accurately assess the cost of the requirements and capabilities, but it is bankrupt. With 

leadership and workforce so short on technical expertise or engineering experience, the 

government repeatedly deludes itself into believing that a require-ments-laden system can 

be built on time and on budget. This tendency to swell the scope and budget of programs 

is inherent in the military-industrial complex even in the best of circumstances, but 

experienced and competent management is usually able to deliver in the end. 

The response to recent space acquisition problems of the lead Service for space, the U.S. 

Air Force, has been to emphasize the acquisition process. Primary focus has been on 

repeated bouts of acquisition reform, back-to-basics campaigns, and other methods. In 

2006, this translated to large cuts in technical engineering specialties among Air Force 

officers with increases in system engineering and acquisition expertise without relevant 

space technical experience.22 Nowhere is the problem worse than in the Air Force space 

programs. 
The lack of technological competence in security space leadership is simple to fix. The 

first step is to demand that all leaders in military and security space programs begin with 

a certified technical grounding. While the U.S. Air Force and other Services and 

organizations continuously emphasize developing and certifying a space cadre,23 the 

actual educational programs and requirements do not include rigorous engineering and 

scientific content; rather, they emphasize space doctrine and acquisition skills. This soft 

skill mix contrasts unfavorably with the rigorous technical requirements for officers 

either entering or maintaining certification in the U.S. Navy's submarine corps.24 To 

remedy these shortcomings, individuals entering space career areas, particularly in 

military officer or civilian management levels, should be required to have technical 

degrees. Specific qualification courses and certification should subsequently emphasize 

technical skills over management-oriented expertise. It is more important that all space 

professionals be versed in orbital dynamics mathematics than being able to recite the 

elements of total quality management. 

A related problem is that top-quality civilian academic credentials matter. While it is true 

that people with degrees from a local college sometimes perform as well or better than 

someone with a degree from a prestigious technical school, this is the exception rather 

than the rule. Thus, security space organizations should make special efforts to recruit

graduates of the highest rated civilian institutions. Moreover, graduate degrees from these 

institutions should be honored and sought. Finally, courses taught and certified by such 

institutions are much more likely to be more rigorous than internally organized "Space 

101" courses developed and taught by the military Services and commands. 

Perhaps most important is for senior civilian leaders and Congress to demand technical 

backgrounds and extensive space experience for those placed in space command or senior 

leadership positions. Until recently, most flag-level leaders in Air Force space 

organizations had little or no actual space background. Often, these leaders were aircraft 

pilots sent to a space billet for career broadening. Consider that the Air Combat 

Command has never had nonpilots in its senior positions, while the Air Force Space 

Command has had few (and at times no) senior leaders with space backgrounds. 

Congress can ensure this is remedied by insisting that senior officers and other appointed 

officials are not accepted unless they have demonstrable and extensive space technical 

credentials and backgrounds. 

DisruptiveTechnologyDevelopment 

While it is important to have a new strategic construct such as the one outlined in this 

chapter (namely, that space capabilities are a primary means of preventing wars versus 

fighting them), such ideas do little good if the hardware and systems do not support this 

approach. It is unlikely that traditional acquisition organizations, such as the Air Force 

Space and Missile Center, will pursue systems to support these new missions. The type of 

capabilities needed for information and global utilities–oriented collaboration probably 

will not be acquired by an organization attending to requirements levied by a Service

fixated on space only as support to warfighters. However, even these existing 
organizations recognize that current structures focused on acquisition are not well suited 

to developing new types of capabilities.25 

What is needed are development organizations chartered to identify new possibilities and 

develop these to the point of capability demonstration. The Department of Defense has 

such an organization: the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA), which 

has a specific mandate to develop new technological capabilities to meet potential longrange security needs. In 2002, in specific response to the Rumsfeld Commission 

recommendations, DARPA greatly increased its focus on space capabilities, particularly 

on fast-paced launch systems in its Falcon program.26 In a similar vein, the short-lived 

DOD Office of Force Transformation (OFT) pushed the development of responsive, lowcost satellites—those systems capable of being launched during a crisis, not so much to 

fight a war as to provide a means of preventing a war. For example, a responsive space 

surveillance system might be launched by the United States or another nation to 

guarantee an agreement between two potentially hostile neighbors. Just such a move 

could have helped defuse the crisis between nuclear-armed India and Pakistan in 2002. 

Each nation accused the other of preparing for an attack. A space-based means of 

verifying that no such attack was in the works and launched by a neutral third party could 

have served much the same way as space systems functioned as national technical means 

of treaty verification during the Cold War. Such systems allowed agreements to be 

developed and verified as a way to keep the peace, not fight a war. 

Unfortunately, neither DARPA nor OFT had a charter or resources to carry the new 

capabilities beyond technical proof-of-concept. Converting these potential new 

capabilities into reality requires a development organization specially chartered for this 

purpose. In addition to lacking such an organization, DARPA also suffered much 

criticism for trying to develop new information technologies for conducting the global 

war on terrorism and has largely stopped pursuing such directions.27 This lack can only be 

remedied with a new organization separate from traditional channels particularly 

chartered and funded to develop war prevention systems. 

A New National Security Organization 

While some personnel policies and even a new development organization are possible, 

none of this will be meaningful without a supportive home for such activities. The 

Rumsfeld Commission recommendations were quickly undone.28 The commission 

recommended establishing a single national security space program including intelligence 

(the National Reconnaissance Office [NRO]) and DOD, mostly Air Force programs. A 

single leader was appointed to oversee both offices. However, no fundamental changes 

were made to any roles and missions. Consequently, traditional vested interests, 

particularly within the Intelligence Community, lobbied successfully to return to having 

the NRO completely separate from DOD programs. Similarly, within DOD, where the 

Rumsfeld Commission had advocated moving toward a new "space force," progress has 

been reversed, with the longstanding U.S. Space Command disestablished and its 

functions integrated into the U.S. Strategic Command (USSTRATCOM), which was 

formerly focused solely on nuclear warfighting and strategic deterrence. The U.S. Air 
Force, once thought to be on the path toward becoming a "space and air" force, is now 

firmly in the "air" column. To show how far the ball has been dropped, the Air Force is 

now seeking to transition many formerly space functions into a new category called "near 

space," whose primary technology would be balloons and airships.29 

In order for real progress to be made in either developing true professionals or novel 

technologies, a completely new organization devoted to a new mission is needed. This 

organization should have a specific charter to work the use of space, information, and 

collaborative international efforts as a crisis mitigation, war prevention focus. It is useful 

to note that USSTRATCOM, which now incorporates most DOD space responsibilities, 

does include many of the necessary elements, including war prevention deterrence 

functions, information operations, space activities, command and control, and 

intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance functions. It may be easiest to expand 

USSTRATCOM's functions to include budget and direct operational control in much the 

same manner as Special Operations Forces are managed by the U.S. Special Operations 

Command. In this way, personnel, research, development, and acquisition would be run 

by leaders with a new focus. If this is done, however, it is essential that senior civilian

leadership in DOD also exercise direct oversight. 

If this new space and war prevention direction and management approach bears fruit, 

these moves could expand—unlike the Rumsfeld Commission's approach—to create a 

new arm of U.S. security assurance including separate budgets, military service, and 

civilian leadership. But it is essential that basic warfighting responsibilities be removed 

from the new organization's functions. Otherwise, backsliding into business as usual, as 

occurred with the good start in 2001 on developing a coherent space approach, will 

swiftly negate even the best intentions of our leaders. 

Conclusion 

The United States faces many security challenges. One of the most significant is the 

growing global use of space capabilities—not just for security but also for a broader 

range of economic, environmental, and political goals. We are not developing the 

necessary technological tools— particularly low-cost, smaller, and fast-development-time 

space systems. We are losing technically competent leadership, resulting in unaffordable 

systems. And we do not have a compelling rationale for our large space expenditures. 

These problems can be remedied in two ways. 

First, there exists a convincing security case for space systems. Space capabilities form 

an increasingly vital role as global utilities, which serve as the glue that enables a truly 

interconnected worldwide economy. By working hard to use new, lower cost space 

capabilities as a crisis management and war prevention device rather than as an adjunct to 

warfighting, space systems and the organizations and people who develop and support 

them can bring a new perspective to the public on space. 

Second, armed with a persuasive rationale, we need to focus on a technically competent 

and intellectually responsive leadership cadre. We need to insist on having our space 
capabilities in the hands of the best and the brightest people. In addition to getting 

technically sophisticated staff, we need a DARPA-like development organization to 

create the affordable space tools to support the new direction. Finally, we need a new 

strategic organization—possibly growing out of the existing U.S. Strategic Command—

to manage all aspects, especially budgeting and technology development. This 

organization needs to be completely separate from traditional national intelligence and 

warfighting military functions. 

With these political recommendations (which, admittedly, will be difficult to implement), 

space can realize its full potential as the lynchpin for 21st-century global security.

Notes

1. Report of the Commission to Assess United States National Security Space Management and 

Organization, Pursuant to Public Law 106–65, January 11, 2001, available at 

<www.defenselink.mil/pubs/ space20010111.html>. This report is often referred to as the Space 

Commission Report or Rumsfeld Report. 

2. The University of Surrey and its Surrey Space Centre have chartered Surrey Satellite Technology, 

Ltd. (SSTL). SSTL's products and approach can be reviewed on its Web site at 

<www.sstl.co.uk/>. The history of small and micro satellites is available through the SSTL Web 

site at <http://centaur.sstl. co.uk/SSHP/>. 

3. The Department of Defense has long had a policy of disproportionately reducing its science and 

technology military expertise. The 2001 National Academy of Sciences' Review of the U.S. 

Department of Defense Air, Space, and Supporting Information Systems Science and Technology 

Program (available at <www.nap.edu/openbook/030907/6080/html/38.html>) raises an alarm 

about the quality and retention of qualified technical personnel. The Air Force reportedly has 

recently slashed its science and engineering officer billets as part of its "force shaping" flight plan. 

Even the Air Force Association warns against cutbacks, stating in its 2007 Statement of Policy (as 

approved at the AFA National Convention, September 24, 2006) that "the Air Force cannot afford 

cutbacks here if it hopes to retain air dominance in the future." 

4. The Disaster Monitoring Constellation is the creation of SSTL. It is now run by a spin-off 

consortium, DMC International Imaging, collocated with SSTL. Details of the systems and 

program are available at <www.dmcii.com/index.html>. 

5. President George W. Bush signed a new National Space Policy on August 31, 2006. On October 

10, 2006, the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy released an unclassified 

summary, available at <www.ostp.gov/html/US%20National%20Space%20Policy.pdf>. 

6. Report of the Commission to Assess United States National Security Space Management and 

Organization (Washington, DC: Commission to Assess United States National Security Space 

Management and Organization, January 11, 2001). 

7. The manufacturer of SAR Lupe, OHB Systems of Bremen, Germany, has provided considerable 

information on the system including an extensive brochure, available at <www.ohbsystem.de/ 

Security/sarlupe.html>. 

8. Much of the background on the space-based infra-red system (SBIRS) problems can be found in 

General Accounting Office (GAO) report GAO–04–48, "Defense Acquisitions: Despite 

Restructuring, SBIRS High Program Remains at Risk of Cost and Schedule Overruns," released 

on October 31, 2003. An additional "Nunn-McCurdy Overrun" breach occurred in 2005. The 

original contract consisted of two high Earth orbit satellite sensors and two to three 

geosynchronous orbit (GEO) sensors (and satellites) with an option to buy a total of five GEOs. In 

December 2005, following the third SBIRS Nunn-McCurdy violation, the government decided to 

compete GEO four and five, with an option to buy GEO three contingent on the performance of 
the first two. Additionally, the government started a potential SBIRS High replacement program in 

late 2006. See <www.spacewar.com/reports/USAF_ Seeks_SBIRS_Alternatives_999.html>. 

9. NPOESS is also suffering bad overruns of at least 10 percent. Almost all major security space 

programs are similar, according to Government Accountability Office (GAO) report GAO–05–

891T, "Space Acquisitions: Stronger Development Practices and Investment Planning Needed to 

Address Continuing Problems," statement of Robert E. Levin, Director, Acquisition and Sourcing 

Management, before the Strategic Forces Subcommittee of the Committee on Armed Services, 

U.S. House of Representatives, July 12, 2005, available at <www.gao.gov/htext/d05891t.html>. 

10. "Space: The Strategic Enabler," remarks by the Honorable Terry Everett, Chairman, Strategic 

Forces Subcommittee, at the Strategic Space and Defense Conference, Omaha, Nebraska, October 

11, 2006. 

11. Randall R. Correll and Simon P. Worden, "The Demise of U.S. Spacepower: Not with a Bang but 

a Whimper," Astropolitics 3, no. 3 (Winter 2005). 

12. This discussion is based on an unpublished manuscript, "Soft Power and Space Capabilities" by 

Simon P. Worden and Major Patrick Chatard-Moulin of the French Air Force prepared in 2005–

2006. Soft power is defined as power based on intangible or indirect influences such as culture, 

values, and ideology; see <www.wordspy.com/words/softpower.asp>. 

13. The May 1998 failure of the PanAmSat Galaxy 4 satellites stopped over 90 percent of electronic 

pagers in NorthAmerica fromoperating.SeeBBC News,"SatelliteFailure Silences Beepers,"May 

20,1998. 

14. The India Space Research Organization has as its primary purpose national and eventual 

international educational and information connectivity. See, for example, a presentation by P.S. 

Roy from the UN-affiliated Centre for Space Science and Technology Education in Asia and the 

Pacific at the 15th UN/International Astronautical Federation Workshop on Space Education and 

Capacity Building for Sustainable Development, Kitakyushu, Japan, October 14–15, 2005. 

15. Randall R. Correll and Nicolas Peter, "Odyssey: Principles for Enduring Space Exploration," 

Space Policy 21, no. 4 (November 2005), 251–258. 

16. The nation of Jordan embarked in the late 1990s on an ambitious program to provide the 

population with good Internet and communications connectivity, particularly in schools. The 

European firm Alcatel played a key role. See a 2003 press release from that company for details of 

this success at <www.home.alcatel.com/vpr/archive.nsf/DateKey/09012003uk>. 

17. NASA and Google are partnering on a variety of new approaches to bring space data to the 

general public as well as a variety of new users. See NASA press release 06–371, "NASA and 

Google to Bring Space Exploration Down to Earth," December 18, 2006, available at 

<www.nasa.gov/home/ hqnews/2006/dec/HQ_06371_Ames_Google.html>. 

18. See <http://earth.google.com>. 

19. Randall R. Correll and Simon P. Worden, "Leadership for New U.S. Strategic Directions," Space 

Policy 21, no. 1 (February 2005), 21–27. 

20. Disruptive technologies were identified in the late 1990s as a key to long-term industrial success. 

The seminal work is by Clayton M. Christensen, The Innovator's Dilemma (Cambridge: Harvard 

Business School Press, 1997). 

21. Commission on the Future of the U.S. Aerospace Industry, Final Report of the Commission on the 

Future of the U.S. Aerospace Industry, November 18, 2002, 4–4, available at 

<www.ita.doc.gov/td/ aerospace/aerospacecommission/AeroCommissionFinalReport.pdf>. The 

commission was established by Congress and the President. It specifically identified that the fact 

that the average U.S. aerospace worker was over the age of 50 is a threat to national security and 

that aerospace fields are no longer high in the new generation's career aspirations. 

22. A report delivered in 2006 by the director of systems acquisition of the Air Force Space and 

Missile Systems Center summarized space experience of major space acquisition leaders. The 

following table is extracted from that report. 

Total Grade Average acquisition experience

(in years)

Average space experience

(in years)

155 Captain 3.3 2.8

55 Major 0.5 1
34 Lieutenant colonel 3.3 1.8

22 Colonel 15 7.5

23. The Air Force Space Command frequently identifies its shortcomings in developing space 

professionals and starts new programs. See, for example, a 2004 initiative on developing a space 

"cadre." Little technical rigor is apparent in the resulting programs. See <www.af.mil/news/story. 

asp?storyID=123008740>. 

24. The U.S. Navy requires substantial basic undergraduate education in engineering, mathematics, 

and physics to enter the submarine corps. In addition, the Navy provides graduate-level education 

before Sailors enter the submarine service; see <www.navy.com/careers/officer/submarine/>. The 

U.S. Air Force has no such technical requirements for entering the space field. It is hard to 

imagine how space operations are less "technical" than submarine operations, but the Air Force 

apparently thinks so. 

25. The establishment of a new Space Development and Test Wing by the Air Force Space Command 

suggests that some within the Air Force recognize the need for a new, different type of 

organization to develop new space capabilities. See 

<www.af.mil/news/story.asp?storyID=123024576>. 

26. The Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency's Falcon program is discussed at <www. 

darpa.mil/tto/programs/falcon.htm>: "The Falcon program objectives are to develop and 

demonstrate hypersonic technologies that will enable prompt global reach missions. This 

capability is envisioned to entail a reusable Hypersonic Cruise Vehicle (HCV) capable of 

delivering 12,000 pounds of payload a distance of 9,000 nautical miles from CONUS in less than 

two hours." 

27. According to Wikipedia:

The Information Awareness Office (IAO) was established by the Defense Advanced Research 

Projects Agency (DARPA), the research and development agency of the United States Department 

of Defense, in January 2002 to bring together several DARPA projects focused on applying 

information technology to counter transnational threats to national security. The IAO mission was 

to "imagine, develop, apply, integrate, demonstrate and transition information technologies, 

components and prototype, closed-loop, information systems that will counter asymmetric threats 

by achieving total information awareness." Following public criticism that the development and 

deployment of these technologies could potentially lead to a mass surveillance system, the IAO 

was defunded by Congress in 2003, although several of the projects run under IAO have continued 

under different funding. 

See <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Information_Awareness_Office>.

28. Simon P. Worden, "High Anxiety," Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists 62, no. 2 (March–April 2006), 

21–23.

29. Hampton Stevens, "Near Space," Air Force Magazine 88, no. 7 (July 2005), available at 

<www.afa.org/magazine/July2005/0705near.asp>.
About the Contributors1

Editors

Colonel Charles D. Lutes, USAF, is the Director for Nonproliferation on the National Security 

Council Staff, a White House position he has held for Presidents George W. Bush and Barack 

H. Obama. From 2004 to 2008, he was a Senior Military Fellow in the Institute for National 

Strategic Studies (INSS) at the National Defense University (NDU), where he served as a 

member of the Future Strategic Concepts Program and was the Principal Investigator for the 

Spacepower Theory Project. Prior to joining INSS, Colonel Lutes served as chief of the 

Weapons of Mass Destruction (WMD) division under the J–5 Deputy Director for the War on 

Terror. He also served in J–5 as chief of the Strategic Plans Branch. He holds degrees in 

engineering from Duke University and the Air Force Institute of Technology and was a 

National Security Fellow at the John F. Kennedy School of Government at Harvard. He is 

also an ABD doctoral candidate in The George Washington University’s Executive 

Leadership Program. Colonel Lutes has logged over 3,000 hours piloting C–5s and KC–135s 

and has commanded an operational support squadron. His major awards include the Defense 

Superior Service Medal, the Defense Meritorious Service Medal, the Meritorious Service 

Medal with two oak leaf clusters, and the Aerial Achievement Medal with oak leaf cluster.

Peter L. Hays is a Senior Scientist for the Science Applications International Corporation 

supporting the Plans and Programs Division of the National Security Space Office (NSSO), a 

position he assumed upon retirement from a 25-year career as an Air Force officer. A subject 

matter expert for national security space policy issues, he led NSSO support for the 2005 

Space Posture Review, 2005 Quadrennial Defense Review, 2006 Space Situational 

Awareness Strategy and Roadmap, National Security Space Strategy, and Air Force White 

Paper for Space Leaders. In addition, Dr. Hays is Chief of Staff for the National Defense 

University Spacepower Theory Study. He holds a Ph.D. in International Relations from the 

Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy and a Master of Arts degree in Defense and Strategic 

Studies from the University of Southern California, and is a 1979 Honor Graduate of the 

USAF Academy. Dr. Hays’ publications include United States Military Space: Into the 21st

Century (USAF Institute for National Strategic Studies, 2002), Spacepower for a New 

Millennium (McGraw-Hill, 2000), Countering the Proliferation and Use of Weapons of Mass 

Destruction (McGraw-Hill, 1998), and American Defense Policy (The Johns Hopkins 

University Press, 1997).

Vincent A. Manzo is a Research Assistant in the Future Strategic Concepts division of the 

INSS at NDU. He is a graduate of the Paul H. Nitze School of Advanced International Studies 

at The Johns Hopkins University. He is the author of An Examination of the Pentagon’s 

Prompt Global Strike Program: Rationale, Implementation, and Risks (Center for Defense 

Information, 2008).

Lisa M. Yambrick is a Writer and Editor at NDU Press. In that capacity, she both edits Joint 

Force Quarterly and is the book review editor for the journal; edits PRISM, a journal 

produced by NDU Press for the Center for Complex Operations; and is the primary editor for 

 1 Most biographies are current as of when the contributor wrote his or her chapter.
2

books produced by NDU Press. Previously, Ms. Yambrick was an intelligence analyst and 

editor at the Defense Intelligence Agency and served in the U.S. Army. She holds a Master of 

Arts degree in Russian/Soviet history from Villanova University.

M. Elaine Bunn is an INSS Senior Fellow, where she is Director of the Future Strategic 

Concepts Program. Before joining INSS in 2000, she was a Senior Executive in the Office of 

the Secretary of Defense, where she worked for 20 years in international security policy. She 

served as Principal Director of Nuclear Forces and Missile Defense Policy from 1993 to 1998. 

During that time, she was executive director of the 1994 Nuclear Posture Review. She was a 

visiting fellow at the RAND Corporation from 199 to 2000. Bunn was seconded from INSS to 

the Office of the Secretary of Defense to help frame issues for both the 2001 and the 2009 

Nuclear Posture Reviews. She served on the Defense Science Board summer study on 

strategic strike in 2003, as well as with an expert working group of the Commission on 

Strategic Posture in 2008–2009. A 1988 graduate of the National War College, Ms. Bunn 

received a Master of Arts in International Security from the Johns Hopkins School of 

Advanced International Studies and a Bachelor of Arts from the University of Georgia, and 

was a Fulbright scholar at l’Université de Neuchâtel, Switzerland. Her publications include a 

number of articles and book chapters on strategic planning, nuclear policy, missile defense, 

preemption, and deterrence.

Contributing Authors

Alexei Arbatov is Head of the Center for International Security at the Russian Academy of 

Science’s Institute for World Economy and International Relations. He is also a Scholar-inResidence and Program Co-chair at the Carnegie Moscow Center of the Carnegie Endowment 

for International Peace. Dr. Arbatov is the author of a number of books and numerous articles 

and papers on issues of global security, strategic stability, disarmament, Russian military 

reform, and various current domestic and foreign political issues.

Ivan Bekey is President of Bekey Designs, Inc., which has provided contract and consultancy 

services in advanced space concepts and technologies to several aerospace industry firms, 

defense and civil government agencies, and Hollywood studios for the past 10 years. 

Previously, he held various senior management positions at NASA Headquarters, including

Director of Advanced Programs and Director of Advanced Concepts, where he was 

responsible for the conceptualization, definition, development, and flight testing of innovative 

advanced space system and launch vehicle technologies. Mr. Bekey also served a term in the 

White House on the National Space Council. He holds a Master of Science degree in 

electronics engineering and controls from the University of California, Los Angeles.

Dean Cheng is Senior Asia Analyst at the CNA Corporation. He is a specialist on the Chinese 

space program and on Chinese security affairs, especially technology issues. He received his 

undergraduate degree in politics from Princeton University and did graduate work at the 

Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Fluent in Mandarin and conversant with high-end 

technologies as well as political-military issues, he is widely published in professional 

journals and edited volumes on Chinese security affairs.
3

John M. Collins is a Distinguished Visiting Research Fellow in the Institute for National 

Strategic Studies at the National Defense University. Previously, he was a Senior Specialist in 

National Defense for the Congressional Research Service, specializing in the U.S.-Soviet 

military balance, military strategy, and planning. Mr. Collins retired as a colonel from the 

U.S. Army. He holds Bachelor’s and Master’s degrees in geography from the University of 

Kansas City and Clark University, respectively. Among his numerous publications are 

Military Strategy: Principles, Practices, and Historical Perspectives (Brassey’s, 2002), 

Military Geography for Professionals and the Public (National Defense University Press, 

1998), Special Operations Forces: An Assessment (National Defense University Press, 1994), 

and America’s Small Wars: Lessons for the Future (Pergamon-Brassey’s, 1991).

Henry F. Cooper, Jr., is Chairman of the Board of High Frontier. Ambassador Cooper’s long 

and distinguished career includes service as the first civilian Director of the Strategic Defense 

Initiative Organization, Chief Negotiator at the Geneva Defense and Space Talks, Assistant 

Director of the Arms Control and Disarmament Agency, and Deputy Assistant Secretary of 

the Air Force. He is also Chairman of Applied Research Associates, Senior Associate of the 

National Institute for Public Policy, and Visiting Fellow at The Heritage Foundation. Author 

of over 100 technical and policy publications, Ambassador Cooper holds Bachelor of Science

and Master of Science degrees from Clemson University and a Ph.D. from New York 

University, all in mechanical engineering. 

Randall R. Correll is Director for Business Development for the Washington office of Ball 

Aerospace and Technologies Corporation. Dr. Correll has more than 25 years of experience in 

space operations, science and technology, and policy in the defense and civil space sectors, 

including as a senior scientist for SAIC and as NASA Headquarters staff scientist on the 

International Space Station research program. He also served 20 years in the U.S. Air Force in 

space operations, research and development, and strategic planning. Dr. Correll holds

Bachelor of Science degrees in aeronautical engineering from the Air Force Institute of 

Technology and in engineering physics from the University of Illinois, a Master of Science 

degree in engineering physics from the Air Force Institute of Technology, and a Ph.D. in 

physics from the University of Texas.

Everett C. Dolman is Professor of Comparative Military Studies at the School of Advanced 

Air and Space Studies at the Air University. Dr. Dolman is also co-founder and managing 

editor of Astropolitics: The International Journal of Space Power and Policy. His published 

works include Pure Strategy: Power and Principle in the Information Age (Frank Cass, 2005),

The Warrior State: How Military Organization Structures Politics (Palgrave, 2005), and

Astropolitik: Classical Geopolitics in the Space Age (Frank Cass, 2002). He has written 

several book chapters as well as articles for the Journal of Strategic Studies, Comparative 

Strategy, Journal of Small Wars and Insurgencies, Soviet and Post-Soviet Review Citizenship 

Studies, Politics and Society, and the Journal of Political and Military Sociology. Dr. Dolman 

received his Ph.D. in political science from the University of Pennsylvania.

Jeffrey Foust is a Program Manager at the Futron Corporation, where he investigates current 

conditions and future trends in domestic and foreign commercial, civil, and military launch 

industries and related markets. His previous professional experience includes work in the 
4

software and publishing industries. Dr. Foust also edited a leading online space news 

publication for several years and currently maintains other online space resources. He has a 

Ph.D. in planetary sciences from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and a Bachelor of 

Science degree in geophysics and planetary science from the California Institute of 

Technology.

Martin E.B. France is a Professor at the United States Air Force Academy and Head of the 

Department of Astronautics. His professional experience includes research and development 

assignments with the Air Force Research Lab working on high-energy laser systems, as the 

Air Force Engineer and Scientist Exchange Officer to France, and as a Program Manager at 

the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency. Colonel France also served as a staff 

officer at Air Force Space Command, the Air Staff, and on the Joint Chiefs of Staff. Colonel 

France, a graduate of the United States Air Force Academy, earned a Master of Science 

degree in aeronautics and astronautics from Stanford University and a Ph.D. in engineering 

science and mechanics from Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University.

Chad Frappier conducts research and analysis for the Futron Corporation, focusing on the 

intersection of commercial and government space activities, military space programs, space 

launch events, launch vehicles, and spaceports. He received a Bachelor of Arts degree in 

political science and history from Purdue University and a Master of Arts in Security Studies 

from Georgetown University, concentrating on the interaction between technology and 

national security.

Joseph Fuller, Jr., is founder and President of Futron Corporation, which specializes in 

innovative business and technology solutions for aerospace, defense, and transportation. He 

has 20 years of experience with NASA as an aerospace systems engineer, project manager, 

and senior executive. While at NASA, Mr. Fuller contributed to the Gemini, Apollo, Skylab, 

Space Shuttle, TIROS/NOAA, and Space Station programs. Mr. Fuller received a Bachelor of 

Science degree in physics from Texas Southern University and a Master of Business 

Administration degree from the University of Houston.

Colin S. Gray is Professor of International Politics and Strategic Studies at the University of 

Reading and is a Senior Fellow at the National Institute for Public Policy. Dr. Gray has taught 

at the Universities of Lancaster, York, and British Columbia. He served as Executive 

Secretary of the Strategic Studies Commission at the Canadian Institute of International 

Affairs, and as Assistant Director of the International Institute for Strategic Studies. Dr. Gray 

became Director of National Security Studies at the Hudson Institute in 1976. From 1982 until 

1987, he served on the President's General Advisory Committee on Arms Control and 

Disarmament. Dr. Gray is the author of several journal articles and books dealing with 

security issues. 

Henry R. Hertzfeld is Research Professor of Space Policy and International Affairs in the 

Space Policy Institute and the Center for International Science and Technology Policy at The 

George Washington University’s Elliott School of International Affairs. He is an expert in the 

economic, legal, and policy issues of space and advanced technological development. Dr. 

Hertzfeld has served as a Senior Economist and Policy Analyst at NASA and the National 
5

Science Foundation and has been a consultant to many U.S. and international organizations. 

Dr. Hertzfeld holds a Bachelor of Arts degree from the University of Pennsylvania, a Master 

of Arts degree from Washington University, and a Ph.D. in Economics from Temple 

University.

Theresa Hitchens is Director of the United Nations Institute for Disarmament Research. Her 

previous positions include Director of the Center for Defense Information, where she led the 

Space Security Project, and Director of Research at the British American Security Information 

Council, a think tank based in Washington and London. Her long career in journalism, 

focusing on military, defense industry, and NATO affairs, has included serving as editor of 

Defense News. The author of Future Security in Space: Charting a Cooperative Course

(Center for Defense Information, 2004), she continues to write on space and nuclear arms 

control issues for a number of publications.

Dustin Kaiser is a Senior Analyst at the Futron Corporation, specializing in business and 

technology analysis of the global commercial spaceflight industry including satellite 

manufacturing, launch, and satellite products and services. He has a Bachelor of Science 

degree in aeronautics and is currently completing a Master of Science degree in space studies 

from the University of North Dakota. 

Michael Katz-Hyman was a Research Associate at the Henry L. Stimson Center on the Space 

Security and South Asia Projects from 2004 until 2007. He holds a Bachelor of Science 

degree in physics with a minor in technology and policy from Carnegie Mellon University.

Michael Krepon is co-founder of the Henry L. Stimson Center and the Diplomat Scholar at 

the University of Virginia. He is the author or editor of 13 books, including Better Safe than 

Sorry: The Ironies of Living with the Bomb (Stanford University Press, 2009), Space 

Assurance or Space Dominance: The Case Against Weaponizing Space (Henry L. Stimson 

Center, 2003), Open Skies: Arms Control and Cooperative Security (St. Martin’s Press, 

1992), and Commercial Observation Satellites and International Security (Palgrave 

Macmillan, 1990).

Benjamin S. Lambeth is a senior staff member at RAND, where he also directed the 

International Security and Defense Policy Program in 1989–1990. A specialist in Russian 

defense policy, airpower, tactical fighter operations, and force development, Dr. Lambeth has 

worked for the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency, the Center for Strategic and International 

Studies, and the Institute for Defense Analyses. He is also an experienced pilot who was the 

first U.S. citizen to fly the Soviet MiG–29 fighter. He serves on the editorial board of the 

Journal of Slavic Military Studies and is a member of the Council on Foreign Relations.

Roger D. Launius is Chair of the Division of Space History at the Smithsonian Institution.

Prior to that, he was the Chief Historian of NASA. Dr. Launius has lectured widely on 

historical subjects to military, scholarly, and general audiences. He has also served on the 

faculties of several colleges and universities. He has written and edited books on aerospace, 

religious, and political history and has received numerous awards for his work.

Dr. Launius received a Ph.D. in history from Louisiana State University.
6

James Andrew Lewis is Director of and Senior Fellow in the Technology and Public Policy

program at the Center for Strategic and International Studies. Previously, he was a career 

diplomat who worked on a range of national security issues during his Federal service. Dr. 

Lewis has authored numerous publications, including Waiting for Sputnik (Center for 

Strategic and International Studies, 2006), Globalization and National Security: Maintaining 

U.S. Technological Leadership and Economic Strength (Center for Strategic and International 

Studies, 2004), Spectrum Management for the 21st Century (Center for Strategic and 

International Studies, 2003), Perils and Prospects for Internet Self-Regulation (Center for 

Strategic and International Studies, 2002), Assessing the Risk of Cyber Terrorism, Cyber War, 

and Other Cyber Threats (Center for Strategic and International Studies, 2002), and 

Strengthening Law Enforcement Capabilities for Counterterrorism (Center for Strategic and 

International Studies, 2001). He earned his Ph.D. from the University of Chicago.

John M. Logsdon is Director of the Space Policy Institute and Professor of International 

Affairs at The George Washington University’s Elliott School of International Affairs. 

Previously, he was also Director of the School’s Center for International Science and 

Technology Policy. Dr. Logsdon is the author of The Decision to Go to the Moon: The Apollo 

Project and the National Interest (MIT Press, 1970) and is general editor of the eight-volume 

series Exploring the Unknown: Selected Documents in the History of the U.S. Civil Space 

Program (NASA History Office, 1995). He has written numerous articles and reports on 

space policy and history and is on the editorial board of the journal Astropolitics. He holds a 

Bachelor of Science degree in physics from Xavier University and a Ph.D. in political science 

from New York University.

James E. Oberg is an American space journalist and historian specializing in the Russian 

space program. After service in the U.S. Air Force, he joined NASA where he worked at 

Johnson Space Center on the space shuttle program. He worked in the Mission Control Center 

for several space shuttle missions from STS–1 on, specializing in orbital rendezvous 

techniques. During the 1990s, he was involved in NASA studies of the Soviet space program, 

with particular emphasis on safety aspects. As a journalist, he writes for several regular 

publications, mostly online; he was previously space correspondent for UPI and ABC.

Michael E. O'Hanlon is a Senior Fellow in Foreign Policy Studies at the Brookings 

Institution, where he specializes in U.S. defense strategy, the use of military force, homeland 

security, and American foreign policy. He is a visiting lecturer at Princeton University and a 

member of the International Institute for Strategic Studies and the Council on Foreign 

Relations. Dr. O’Hanlon’s latest book is Defense Strategy for the Post-Saddam Era

(Brookings, 2005). He also recently completed The Future of Arms Control (Brookings, 

2005), co-authored with Michael Levi, as well as Neither Star Wars nor Sanctuary: 

Constraining the Military Uses of Space (Brookings, 2004). He received Bachelors and 

Masters degrees in the physical sciences and a Ph.D. in public and international affairs, all 

from Princeton University.

Scott Pace is the Associate Administrator for Program Analysis and Evaluation at NASA. 

Previously, he served as the Deputy Chief of Staff to the NASA Administrator and the Chief 
7

Technologist for Space Communications in the Office of Space Operations. Dr. Pace served

in the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy as the Assistant Director for 

Space and Aeronautics and in the Department of Commerce as the Deputy Director and 

Acting Director of Space Commerce, where he coordinated international space policy issues. 

Dr. Pace received his Master of Science degree in aeronautics and astronautics from the 

Massachusetts Institute of Technology and his Ph.D. in policy analysis from the RAND 

Graduate School. 

Xavier Pasco is a Senior Research Fellow at the Fondation pour la Recherche Stratégique,

where he heads the Technology, Space, and Security department. Previously, he was a 

researcher of the relationships between strategies and technology at the Center for Research 

and Evaluation associated with Ecole Polytechnique. Pasco is also Associate Professor at the 

University of Marne-la-Vallée and Fellow at the Space Policy Institute in The George 

Washington University, and he lectures at the French Military School in Paris. He is the 

European editor of the international academic review Space Policy.

Robert L. Pfaltzgraff, Jr., is the Shelby Cullom Davis Professor of International Security 

Studies in The Fletcher School at Tufts University. He is also founder and President of the 

Institute for Foreign Policy Analysis, an independent, nonpartisan research organization. He 

has advised key U.S. Government officials on military strategy, defense modernization, the 

future of the Atlantic Alliance, proliferation and counterproliferation issues, and arms control 

policy. He has lectured widely at government, industry, and academic forums in the United 

States and overseas. He currently serves on the International Security Advisory Board at the 

U.S. Department of State and is a member of the board’s WMD Terrorism Task Force.

Eligar Sadeh is an Assistant Director for the Center for Space and Defense Studies at the 

United States Air Force Academy. From 2001 to 2006, he was an Assistant Professor of 

Space Studies in the School of Aerospace Sciences at the University of North Dakota. 

Previously, Sadeh worked for Lockheed-Martin as a space systems engineer. He also serves 

as a Research Associate with the Space Policy Institute at The George Washington 

University, as editor of Astropolitics: The International Journal of Space Politics and Policy, 

editor of Space and Defense: Journal of the Center for Space and Defense Studies, and on the 

editorial board of the Space Policy journal. Dr. Sadeh has published in Space Policy, 

Astropolitics, and other peer-reviewed journals and is editor of Space Politics and Policy: An 

Evolutionary Perspective (Kluwer Academic, 2002). 

Jerry Jon Sellers is an international research and development liaison officer in London, 

where he writes and consults on space mission analysis and design. He has over 13 years’ 

experience at various astronautics assignments including the NASA Johnson Space Center, 

where he worked in Space Shuttle Mission Control, and the U.S. Air Force Academy, where 

he served on the faculty of the Department of Astronautics. He was a distinguished graduate 

from the U.S. Air Force Academy and has earned Master of Science degrees in physical 

science from the University of Houston and in aeronautics and astronautics from Stanford 

University, and a Ph.D. in satellite engineering from the University of Surrey. 
8

John B. Sheldon is Professor of Comparative Military Studies at the School of Advanced Air 

and Space Studies, Air University. A former diplomat, Dr. Sheldon is the founding co-editor 

of the journal Astropolitics and has lectured and taught military space issues at the Royal 

United Services Institute for Defence Studies and the Higher Command and Staff Course at 

the Joint Services Command and Staff College. Dr. Sheldon has published in the RUSI 

Journal, Airpower Journal, and Space News.

Colonel M.V. Smith, USAF, is Director of the Air Force Space and Cyber Center at Air 

University. He served in the Pentagon’s National Security Space Office as the Chief of the 

Future Concepts shop, which explores, develops, advocates, and links future concepts, 

capabilities, and promising technologies to advance the art of space faring across the security

sector. Colonel Smith was the director of the Space-based Solar Power Study, and he served 

as a Visiting Military Fellow at National Defense University. He has served in various space 

and missile positions and as an instructor at the USAF Weapons School.

Paul D. Spudis is a Senior Staff Scientist at the Lunar and Planetary Institute. He was formerly 

with the Branch of Astrogeology, U.S. Geological Survey and the Applied Physics Laboratory. 

He has served on numerous groups advisory to the National Aeronautics and Space 

Administration, including the Committee for Planetary and Lunar Exploration of the National 

Academy of Sciences and the Synthesis Group, a panel of the Executive Office of the President 

that in 1990–1991 analyzed a return to the Moon to establish a base and the first human mission 

to Mars. Dr. Spudis was Deputy Leader of the Science Team for the Department of Defense 

Clementine mission to the Moon in 1994 and Principal Investigator of Mini-SAR, an imaging 

radar experiment on the Indian Chandrayaan-1 mission that orbited the Moon in 2008–2009. He 

holds a Bachelor of Science degree and a Ph.D. from Arizona State University and a Master of 

Science degree from Brown University. He is the author or coauthor of over 100 scientific papers 

and four books, including The Once and Future Moon (Smithsonian Institution Press, 1998) and 

The Clementine Atlas of the Moon (Cambridge University Press, 2004).

Jon T. Sumida is Associate Professor of History at the University of Maryland. He also is a 

visiting lecturer at the U.S. Marine Corps School of Advanced Warfighting and the U.S. 

Army Advanced Strategic Arts Program. Dr. Sumida is the author of Decoding Clausewitz: A 

New Approach to On War (University of Kansas Press, 2008), Inventing Grand Strategy and 

Teaching Command: The Classic Works of Alfred Thayer Mahan Reconsidered (Woodrow 

Wilson Center Press, 1997), and In Defence of Naval Supremacy: Finance, Technology, and 

British Naval Policy, 1889–1914 (Unwin Hyman, 1989), and was editor of The Pollen 

Papers: The Privately Circulated Printed Works of Arthur Hungerford Pollen, 1901–1916

(Naval Records Society, 1983). 

Martin Sweeting is the Director of the Surrey Space Center, where he leads a team of 60 

researchers investigating advanced small satellite concepts and techniques. He also is the 

Chief Executive Officer of Surrey Satellite Technology Limited, where he pioneered the 

development of small, economical satellites for commercial, scientific, and military 

applications. In 2008, Sir Martin was given the Sir Arthur Clarke Lifetime Achievement 

Award, which pays tribute to those who have worked for the advancement of space 

exploration.
9

David Vaccaro is a Senior Analyst with the Futron Corporation. He is experienced in spaceoriented research and analysis regarding launch vehicles, national space programs, U.S. 

military space projects, payloads, and related organizations. Mr. Vaccaro earned his Bachelor 

of Science degree in Science, Technology, and International Affairs from Georgetown 

University, where his studies focused on telecommunications as an avenue for economic 

development.

Dennis Wingo is the founder and President of SkyCorp as well as the Chief Technical Officer 

of the Orbital Recovery Group. As a pioneer in the space community, he has served as an 

Engineering Consultant for Space America, a Small Satellite Program Manager at the 

University of Alabama, and a Test Engineer with Alpharel. He is the author of Moonrush: 

Improving Life on Earth with the Moon’s Resources (Collector’s Guide Publishing, 2004) and 

of numerous articles, reports, and opinion pieces. He received his Master of Science degree in 

engineering physics from the University of Alabama, Huntsville. 

Harold R. Winton is Professor of Military History and Theory at the School of Advanced Air 

and Space Studies (SAASS) at Air University. Prior to assuming that post as one of the four 

founding faculty members of SAASS in 1990, he was a Professor of Military Art and Science 

and deputy director at the School of Advanced Military Studies, where he was a founding 

faculty member. Dr. Winton retired from Active duty in the U.S. Army in 1989. He is a 

graduate of the United States Military Academy and received a Master of Arts and a Ph.D. in 

history from Stanford University. He is the author of Corps Commanders of the Bulge: Six 

American Generals and Victory in the Ardennes (University Press of Kansas, 2007) and To

Change an Army: General Sir John Burnett-Stuart and British Military Reform, 1927–1938

(University Press of Kansas, 1988), and is co-editor of The Challenge of Change: Military 

Institutions and New Realities, 1918–1941 (University of Nebraska Press, 2000).

Simon P. Worden is Director of the NASA Ames Research Center. Prior to becoming 

Director, Dr. Worden was a Research Professor of Astronomy, Optical Sciences, and 

Planetary Sciences at the University of Arizona, where his primary research direction was the 

development of large space optics for national security and scientific purposes and near-Earth 

asteroids. Dr. Worden retired from the U.S. Air Force as a brigadier general in 2004 after 29 

years of Active service. During his career, he commanded the 50th Space Wing, which is 

responsible for more than 60 Department of Defense satellites. He then served as Deputy 

Director for Requirements at Headquarters Air Force Space Command, as well as the Deputy 

Director for Command and Control with the Office of the Deputy Chief of Staff for Air and 

Space Operations at Air Force Headquarters. Dr. Worden received a Bachelor of Science 

degree from the University of Michigan and a Ph.D. in astronomy from the University of 

Arizona. He has authored or co-authored more than 150 scientific technical papers in 

astrophysics, space sciences, and strategic studies.

Robert Zubrin is the founder and President of the Mars Society, an international organization 

dedicated to furthering the exploration and settlement of Mars by public and private means. 

He is also President of Pioneer Astronautics, an aerospace research and development

company, where he has been principal investigator of numerous research and development 

efforts in areas including spacecraft and launch vehicle propulsion systems, Mars and lunar in 
10

situ resource utilization technology, EVA life support and propulsion, and robotic exploration 

systems. Dr. Zubrin holds a Master of Science degree in aeronautics and astronautics and a 

Ph.D. in nuclear engineering from the University of Washington. In addition to over 200 

technical and nontechnical papers, Dr. Zubrin has authored five books, including Mars on 

Earth (Tarcher, 2003), Entering Space: Creating a Spacefaring Civilization (Tarcher, 1999), 

and The Case for Mars: How We Shall Settle the Red Planet and Why We Must (Touchstone, 

1996).