“Adversaries are leveraging space … targeting and extending the range of their weapons,” said General Saltzman.
“That’s really the change that happens inside the domain.”
Countries are increasingly secretive when it comes to their military activities in space but the race is such that in 2019, the year that the Pentagon launched its Space Force, it predicted that Russia and China could potentially overtake the United States.
Saltzman rejects the idea that Washington is behind.
But the fight has evolved, shifting from the idea of destroying satellites with missiles or “kamikaze” satellites, to that of finding ways of damaging them with laser weapons or powerful microwaves.
“I am always going to make sure that I preserve capabilities to do the most critical functions, like national command and control, or nuclear command and control,” said the general.
“RESPONSIBLE BEHAVIOUR”
The Ukraine war has served as a reminder of the fundamental importance of space in conflicts today and in the future.
“Space is important to the modern fight,” said Saltzman.
“You can attack space without going (into) space, through cyber networks or other vectors. We have to make sure we are defending all these capabilities.”
The growing military activity, combined with increasing commercial production, does however raise the potential problems of collateral damage, destructive debris and, more broadly, an international code of conduct.
Saltzman has never held talks with his Chinese and Russian counterparts, his aides told AFP. In Munich, he met Norway’s defence minister and participated in a panel.
“We talked about responsible behaviour,” he said. “There is proper way to behave in space, that is not debris-generating, that does not interfere, that has safe distances and safe trajectories, and we communicate when we have problems.”
Space will become “more and more congested”, he added.
“If we can operate with a clear understanding of what the standards are, we are going to be a lot safer.”
(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by PostX News and is published from a syndicated feed.)
