DoD space protection strategy: resilience, defense, and offense by another name

WASHINGTON — An unclassified Defense Department strategy for protecting US military and intelligence-gathering satellites, released today [PDF], prioritizes making them less vulnerable to attack — while emphasizing that the US will not only defend its space systems but will also target enemy space capabilities during wartime.

“To preserve U.S. freedom of operations and support deterrence, the United States must be prepared to deny adversaries the ability to utilize space capabilities and services to attack the Joint Force and prevent the United States from advancing critical national security objectives,” the document states.

“Joint Force space operations could deny an adversary’s space and counterspace capabilities and services using a variety of reversible and irreversible means, reducing the effectiveness and lethality of adversary forces across all domains. Operations to deny adversary hostile use of space could originate in any domain and target on-orbit, ground, cyber, and/or link segments to reduce the full spectrum of an adversary’s ability to exploit the space domain.”

The strategy, mandated by Congress in the fiscal 2023 National Defense Authorization Act, is bundled with a space policy review to reflect the changing threat landscape called for in the FY22 version of the annual policy bill. Part of the rational for the congressional demands was to lift some of the veil of secrecy surrounding national security space and explain US intentions not just to the American public, but also allies and adversaries alike.

“Our ability to share this policy and strategy is a key step towards normalizing space as an operational domain. And I’m glad we have an opportunity to publicly articulate this approach more clearly,” said DoD Assistant Secretary for Space Policy John Plumb in a briefing for reporters Wednesday.

The new document breaks little new ground, but instead serves as a kind of a primer on US national security space policy, strategy, doctrine and organization at both the Pentagon and the Intelligence Community — in effect, encapsulating how the US intends to handle space threats from China and Russia.

“It’s the clearest and most comprehensive unclassified articulation yet of our approach to protecting national security interests in space,” said Plumb. It is designed to “help communicate the policy [and] strategy steps we’re taking to improve space mission assurance, including building resilient architectures, improve our ability to protect and defend our systems, improve space domain awareness.”

He added that the strategy also communicates “our commitment to protect the Joint Force from adversary hostile uses of space” — a goal that Chief of Space Operations Gen. Chance Saltzman also has been stressing as a key role for his service.

What is does not directly do is address how the US might also protect and defend commercial space companies contracted to provide support to DoD and the IC during wartime, Plumb said, noting that the issue of commercial was not included in the congressional mandate.

Focus On Growing Chinese Space Power

While Plumb was quick to stress that DoD is not “seeking conflict” with China or with anyone else in space, Beijing is clearly in the crosshairs of both US signaling rhetoric and emerging plans to go on the offense to target adversary space systems — although in keeping with Pentagon talking points neither Plumb nor the policy/strategy document uses the O-word.

“China is developing and rapidly growing its ability to leverage space to enhance its own combat power to fight and win a modern military conflict. … [I]ncreasingly sophisticated and proliferated space-based ISR [intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance] networks and improved command and control systems increase the precision and accuracy of missile systems the PRC would employ to deter and counter U.S. forward presence and operations, especially in the Western Pacific,” the paper elaborates.

Section III of the 20 page report — called “Deterring,  Responding to, and Countering Threats to the Space Operations of the United States and its Allies and Partners” — contains the meat of the protect and defend strategy, although not perhaps in the kind of detail Congress was hoping for. It reads:

DoD will defend our national security interests from the growing scope and scale of counterspace threats. We will:

• • Assure critical space-based missions by accelerating the transition to more resilient architectures and by protecting and defending critical systems against counterspace threats;
  • Strengthen the ability to detect and attribute hostile acts in, from, and to space; and
  • Protect the Joint Force from adversary hostile uses of space.

Yet Another Coordinating Committee

The document also revealed a new organizational effort to better align policies of the various organizations within DoD and the IC involved in national security space, called the “Space Warfighting Activities Group” with Plumb as chair.

The group, according to the document, is “a body of DoD and intelligence community entities that convenes to review upcoming sensitive space activities to ensure a common operating picture and alignment on space warfighting policy and strategy.”

Plumb said the new(ish) group was an outgrowth of the classified Strategic Space Review completed last November.

The new high-level policy group also comes in the wake of a 2021 agreement between the National Reconnaissance Office, the National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency, the Space Force and Space Command. Dubbed the “Protected Defense Strategic Framework” sought to clarify roles and improve collaboration of space acquisition and operations, and improve communications among the signatories.

While Plumb said many of the issues discussed during the group’s monthly meetings are classified, “generally speaking” the talks revolve around “policy we have to shape,” which in turn “inform, at some level, acquisitions.”

That said, he explained that coordinating Pentagon and IC acquisition of space systems is the job of the Space Acquisition Council, chaired by Assistant Secretary of the Air Force for Space Acquisition and Integration Frank Calvelli. Plumb noted that Calvelli sits on his new group, and he sits on Calvelli’s group.

The Space Warfighting Activities Group has a couple of key functions, Plumb said. One is “to clear obstacles to an individual component, or satellites or systems that we’re trying to make sure succeed.” A second is focused on activities “inside the building” and sharing information.

“There are many, many different agencies — I guess I should say components — that work on space and have space interests and having a place to bring all this information together and socialize it is really proving valuable,” Plumb added.