Of all the potential threats that China poses to the United States, the most worrisome for me is future domination of space. Quietly but persistently, the Chinese are developing an arsenal of weapons to challenge America — the nation that landed the first man on the moon — for preeminence in this domain.
The idea that the heavens are becoming a zone of potential conflict is abhorrent. Looking at the recent photographs taken by the James Webb Space Telescope is a reminder of the majesty and transcendent mystery of space. But, unfortunately, there is abundant evidence of aggressive Chinese military moves on this frontier.
The Chinese tested the first anti-satellite weapon in 2007, which left a field of thousands of pieces of debris that still endanger other satellites. Since then, they have tested satellites that can snatch other craft and carry them to a distant orbit known as the “graveyard zone.” They have flown spaceplanes that can also capture objects in orbit and have talked of building bases on the moon. Their researchers have described ways to use satellites to conduct cyberattacks in space. And then there are the spy balloons in near space.
The point is: Beijing recognizes that space is the ultimate “high ground” and wants to control it.
The United States, the space pioneer, was slow to recognize China’s ambitions. NASA controlled civilian space flight, but when the moonshots ended and the Space Shuttle was retired, the United States seemed to lose interest. The Air Force was responsible for military aspects of space, but its attention was closer to Earth, and it didn’t react adequately to China’s rapid moves. President Donald Trump created a new branch of the military, the Space Force, to respond to the challenge, and it was one of the few solid decisions of his presidency.
I had a chance to discuss space issues this week with four of the leading American experts: Gen. James H. Dickinson, head of U.S. Space Command; John F. Plumb, assistant secretary of defense for space policy; Ezinne Uzo-Okoro, assistant director for space policy in the Office of Science and Technology Policy; and Salvatore “Tory” Bruno, chief executive of the rocket-building company United Launch Alliance. They were all speaking at the Aspen Security Forum, which I moderated.
The first takeaway from these conversations is that they recognize that, in space, China is the “pacing threat,” as the new buzz phrase describes it. If you want a quick summary of China’s remarkable space array, check out the latest “Space Threat Assessment” published by the Center for Strategic and International Studies, which is the best collection of open-source reports.
A second theme is that the United States’ response to China’s bid for dominance will be a mix of government systems and commercial satellite arrays being developed by SpaceX’s Starlink, Maxar and many dozens of other “New Space” companies that are building what amount to commercial communications and surveillance networks in low-Earth orbit. The Pentagon is partnering with more than 130 of these companies, Plumb said. China can’t match this explosion of private entrepreneurial effort.
In November, the Pentagon published a detailed “space strategic review” discussing the Chinese threat and what to do about it. Unfortunately, like nearly everything else that explores offensive and defensive strategies for dealing with Beijing, it’s classified. At Aspen, Plumb repeated past comments that “space is overclassified,” but he didn’t shed any new light on U.S. plans. Neither did Dickinson, the head of Space Command.
I wish these officials would heed the 2021 advice of Gen. John Hyten, at the time vice chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. “Deterrence does not happen in the classified world.” The closest any Pentagon official has come to confirming that the United States is building weapons to deter China in space was Air Force Secretary Frank Kendall’s comment in March explaining his plans to spend money for “offensive capabilities” in fiscal 2024: “There are hard kill and soft kill capabilities, if you will, that we’re funding. But I’m not sure I can go very far beyond that.”
The Chinese appear to be preparing for a kind of cyberwar in space that would jam or disable satellites. That was the gist of Pentagon documents allegedly leaked by Airman Jack Teixeira that were published by The Post. One document said China could use cyberattacks “to seize control of a satellite, rendering it ineffective to support communications, weapons, or intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance systems.”
Chinese journalists have reported some of Beijing’s cyber plans. A researcher at a People’s Liberation Army-supported think tank published a study arguing that “a combination of soft and hard kill methods should be adopted to make some of Starlink’s satellites lose their functions and destroy the constellation’s operating system,” according to a May 25, 2022, article in the South China Morning Post. China could use “high-power microwave weapons” against the Starlink satellites, argued a March 30 article by that paper’s Beijing correspondent.
As thousands of satellites maneuver in this newly contested domain, there’s an obvious need to establish norms and standards of conduct. I asked Uzo-Okoro from the White House whether there had been any discussion with China about such rules of the road. “Not particularly,” she said.
That has to change. Otherwise, the United States could find itself surrendering its once-formidable lead on the final frontier.
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