Space in Military Planning
Col. Daniel Smith, USA (Ret.), Center for Defense Information,
202-797-5280
As the date draws near for the unveiling of the Rumsfeld make-over of
the Pentagon, evidence continues to mount that space will assume an ever
growing prominence in military plans and operations.
Indeed, Donald Rumsfeld's appointment as Secretary of Defense while he
was still serving as chairperson of the congressionally chartered Commission
to Assess U.S. National Security Space Management and Organization unmistakenly
pointed to a greater Pentagon use of the "high frontier." The
thrust of the Commission's recommendations emphasize space as a theater
of war and streamline the Pentagon's organization for operations in space.
The Commission also laid the foundation for a future separation of the
space mission from the existing service structures by suggesting that
a Space Corps may eventually be needed.
The military has been in space for decades. The primary uses of space
have been to support the planning for and the conduct of terrestrial operations.
Satellites in the "Lacrosse" series use cloud-penetrating radar
and the "Talent Keyhole" series use optical cameras to collect
images. Communications and other electronic signals are routinely intercepted
by satellites launched under the aegis of the National Reconnaissance
Office. Over the next decade, new sensing satellites whose primary mission
will be to detect and track hostile intercontinental ballistic missiles
aimed at the United States are scheduled to be launched as are newer versions
of spy satellites. Congress may even be induced to resurrect the Discover
II satellite program that it refused to fund last year. Discover II would
provide commanders real-time radar images of moving targets, something
now done by airplanes. In fact, this was a specific recommendation of
the Space Commission.
Such uses, together with the myriad of satellites used to transmit information
to and from U.S. forces in the field, have become so routine that many
now question whether the Pentagon could function should it be unable to
use space assets. In fact, the reliance on space for intelligence gathering
(and on other technical collection means) has raised a cautionary flag
about the ability of the united States to correctly gauge the nature and
the extent of potential threats and therefore the Pentagon's priorities.
At best satellites can indicate movements of forces, construction of new
equipment, preparations for tests, and other physical changes to a nation's
military posture. What they cannot do is fathom the intentions of the
leadership of another country, pick out the centers of power, uncover
timetables, detect policy changes--the non-physical aspects that are critical
to determining what course of action is contemplated by friends, competitors,
or adversaries.
While space has been militarized for years, it has never been weaponized.
Space "operations" per se--launching attacks from or conducting
defense in space--remains in the future. The nearest the Pentagon has
come to such operations have been tests of an anti-satellite missile launched
from a high-flying airplane and a low-power, ground-based laser that reportedly
succeeded in "dazzling" optical systems on an old U.S. Air Force
satellite.
That may well come to an end in this decade. The offensive "weapon"
of choice will undoubtedly be lasers. So far, their primary use has been
to designate targets for precision munitions and as range-finders. One
problem with lasers is that the focus (and therefore the intensity) of
the beam are susceptible to degradation due to atmospheric conditions,
particularly over water. Another is the physical bulk associated with
the source of the beam. For example, the twenty-year old Mid-Infrared
Advanced Chemical Laser (MIRACL) originally built for the Navy, is too
large even for a ship. The Army's experimental Tactical High Energy Laser
(THEL), a chemical-based laser which has successfully destroyed short-range
Soviet built Katyusha rockets, is as large as a small house. Developing
a mobile version would take the better part of a decade.
One way around atmospheric distortion is to mount the laser is an airplane
operating in the upper atmosphere. The Air Force has been pursuing the
Airborne Laser (ABL) program as part of the Pentagon's national missile
defense (NMD) effort, but funding ($234 million for FY2001 plus an "infusion
of $98 million by the Air Force and defense contractors in Fiscal Year
2001) and schedule slippage have been problems. Nonetheless, the vast
decrease in size-to-computational power of modern computers has made the
possibility of mounting a chemical laser on a transport-size airplane
a reality.
The same advantage accrues to what the Pentagon really is aiming for:
a space-based laser (SBL). The initially launch of the satellite carrying
this chemical laser, also part of the NMD constellation, is programmed
for 2012 with a demonstration of the detection-tracking-destruction capability
against an intercontinental ballistic missile the next year. One contractor
says it has successfully tested a beam control system that kept the laser
on target. If successfully developed, the number of SBL satellites the
Pentagon envisions may go as high as 40. Program costs are more indeterminate,
ranging from $40 to $100 billion. For 2001 Congress appropriated $147.5
million and Clinton Administration projections through Fiscal Year 2005
showed annual requests of about $150 million. Now, however, if the rumored
annual addition of $25 billion for Defense Department procurement proves
accurate, SBL may receive some $2.3 billion more over the next seven years-on
average more than triple its current projected annual appropriation.
Undoubtedly, given enough time and enough money, the United States can
continue its programs of developing and orbiting communications, information
gathering, and laser weapon satellites far superior to anything that other
nations can produce. But for those that see themselves as adversaries,
emulating the U.S. is not the only avenue. Military annals are replete
with instances in which technical and nontechnical countermeasures--even
non-military stratagems--have "leveled the battle-space" by
neutralizing the technological advantages of an opponent. Military history
remains a competition of offensive-defensive advances; it will not end
simply because the United States enjoys technological dominance today.
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