China has launched dozens of satellites in the past six months and the People’s Liberation Army now has 347 orbiting craft capable of gathering intelligence on US armed forces, according to the head of the US Space Force.
General Chance Saltzman told senators Beijing was the ‘most immediate threat’ to US operations as it develops lasers to disrupt satellite sensors, electronic warfare jammers and even builds grab-and-move craft the rival orbiting platforms out of position.
It’s all part of his plan for a fully modernized, world-class military designed to realize China’s “space dream” of being the most powerful nation in space by 2045, he said.
“Over the past six months, China has completed 35 launches adding advanced communications and intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance (ISR) satellites to its orbital architecture,” he said in a written statement on Tuesday. to the Senate Armed Services Subcommittee on Strategic Forces.
“Of the more than 700 Chinese operational satellites in orbit, 347 are People’s Liberation Army ISR platforms providing optical, radar and radio frequency capabilities that track the Joint Force around the world.”
People’s Liberation Army now has 347 satellites capable of gathering intelligence on US armed forces, says US Space Force chief Gen Chance Saltzman
A new remote sensing satellite is launched by a Long March-2C rocket on March 13
Top US generals have repeatedly warned that China’s investment in space technology, including reusable rockets, threatens US supremacy in space.
Chinese officials have even compared the Moon and Mars to islands in the South China Sea that Beijing is trying to claim as its own.
“China and Russia continue to develop, field and deploy a range of weapons for US space capabilities,” the general said.
“The spectrum of threats to US space capabilities includes cyber warfare activities, electronic attack platforms, directed energy lasers designed to blind or damage satellite sensors, ground-to-orbit missiles to destroy satellites and space-to-space orbital engagement systems that can attack US satellites in space.
Saltzman told senators that Beijing — and Moscow — had studied how US forces depended on satellites for a range of combat functions.
“Whether it’s our navigation and precision timing, whether it’s satellite communications, the missile warning we rely on, and the persistence of intelligence, surveillance and the recognition that we have with space abilities… they know we rely on that and so if they can blind us, if they can interfere with those abilities, or God forbid destroy them completely, they know that will diminish our advantages and will put the joint force at risk,” he said.
“So I can see interfering, I can see blinding, I can see some of these sorts of gray area attacks on our abilities to try and get us behind the eight ball.”
He described how Space Force planned to go from being more vulnerable. from large geostationary satellites to constellations of small satellites in low and medium Earth orbit.
Latest budget includes an additional $3.9 billion for the Space Force
The green lights captured by the Subari-Asashi Star Camera were initially thought to have come from an American satellite, but it was later discovered that they likely came from a Chinese satellite. They rained on Hawaii at the end of January
“As far as seizing satellites and removing them from orbit, much more difficult to manage when you have older satellites that are less manageable,” he said.
‘Again, move on to a proliferation [low earth orbit] constellation where you don’t have what General Hyten called a “fat juicy target” sitting there in a [geostationary orbit] makes it a much tougher proposition to execute against them.
The US Space Force’s $30 billion budget request for fiscal year 2024 is about $3.9 billion more than what was passed for the service in fiscal year 2023.
More than 60% of the Space Force budget, worth about $19.2 billion, is for research, development, test and evaluation.
“China, our pace challenge, is the most immediate threat in, to, and from space for which Space Force must maintain a technological edge and be prepared to defend vital national security interests,” Saltzman added. in his statement.
“Russia, while less capable, remains an acute threat that is developing asymmetric counterspace systems intended to neutralize US satellites.
“Both states recognize the advantage that space offers the United States.”
