Russia has satellites that launch projectiles into space, land-based missiles to shoot down satellites, and jamming and cyber capabilities to disrupt communication, but the Pentagon was again silent Wednesday on U.S. offensive capabilities in space.
“We are absolutely at risk with the pace that they are developing these capabilities, and these are very serious threats,” said Stephen Kitay, deputy secretary of defense for space policy, at a Pentagon briefing.
“We are going to have space — we need to maintain our space superiority,” Kitay said.
The briefing served to announce the release of the Space Force 2020 Defense Space Strategy, which describes how the new service will transition from viewing space as a support function to a war fighting domain.
Defense Secretary Mark Esper described wide-ranging changes that are part of a 10-year strategy described in the plan.
“Our adversaries have made space a warfighting domain and we have to implement enterprise-wide changes to policies, strategies, operations, investments, capabilities, and expertise for this new strategic environment,” Esper said in a statement on Wednesday.
In 2017, the Defense Intelligence Agency and the State Department observed a Russian satellite release a second satellite that then fired a “high-speed projectile,” Kitay said.
Space Force Commander Gen. Jay Raymond said in February that a similar Russian satellite was observed maneuvering close to a U.S. government satellite. The satellite ejected a second satellite that appeared to chase the U.S. satellite and synchronize with its orbit.
No projectile was fired from the second satellite, and the U.S. satellite moved away, but the capacity to chase a purported U.S. spy satellite had been established.
Kitay said that U.S. satellites are “hardened” against some attacks, but he declined to discuss offensive capabilities that exist now when asked by the Washington Examiner.
“I’m not going to speak to specific systems here today,” he said. “Our policy and strategy recognizes the multitude of anti-satellite developments of our competitors.”
Kitay also acknowledged that nuclear-armed adversaries could “fry” the electronics of satellites indiscriminately by detonating a nuclear weapon that would release a powerful electromagnetic pulse in space.
“That is a threat that we have to potentially be prepared for,” he said.
When pressed on the issue of current offense capabilities, Kitay described a variety of measures to protect satellites, but he did not mention weapons or offensive capabilities.
“We’re able to assure our systems, which has elements of resilience, has elements of defensive measures, and has elements of even thinking about reconstituting,” he said. “There’s other systems that we would accept some sort of degraded service depending on the needs of the war fighter.”
