Theresa Hitchens is the Senior reporter, Space at Breaking Defense. The former Defense News editor was a senior research associate at the University of Maryland’s Center for International and Security Studies at Maryland (CISSM). Before that, she spent six years in Geneva, Switzerland as director of the United Nations Institute for Disarmament Research (UNIDIR).
A sci-fi geek, voracious reader, enthusiastic cook, dabbler in poetry, Theresa is also the proud mom of a wonderful young man by the name of Nicholas.
"The three new rules ... recalibrate our approach to export controls," a senior Commerce Department official said. "These changes will offer relief to US companies and they'll increase innovation without compromising the critical technologies that keep our nation safe."
The new effort for microHABs is being led by the Army's Program Executive Office for Aviation, Andrew Evans, director of the Army's ISR Task Force, told Breaking Defense, which for the moment is the primary acquisition shop overseeing the service's pursuit of systems that can operate at the upper edges of the stratosphere — roughly between 60,000 and 100,000 feet, and just below orbital space.
The Sixth Domain is not defined by geography. It’s a new kind of conflict in which autonomy and networked systems allow thousand-dollar consumer electronics to destroy multi-million-dollar conventional weapons systems.
Citing new space-based threats, Rome and Washington pledge to work more closely in orbit and are paving the way for US space launches from Italian soil.
Col. Mark Cobos, head of SMDC's 1st Space Brigade, told Breaking Defense in an Oct. 7 interview that the command and the brigade are already "making progress" in creating allied partnerships — starting with the United Kingdom.
SPACECOM's releases today characterize Operation Olympic Defender as "a multinational effort that focuses to optimize space operations, improve mission assurance, enhance resilience of space-based systems, synchronize efforts to strengthen deterrence against hostile actors and reduce the spread of debris orbiting the Earth."
The UK's Defence Science and Technology Laboratory, on behalf of the Ministry of Defence and UK Space Command, will contribute an experimental sensor package to the "Redwing" project, managed by Canada's defense research organization, Defence Research and Development Canada.
Do more with less: streamline workflows, reduce duplication, invest upfront to save long-term.
US Space Command has been clamoring for new technology to enable "dynamic space operations," which include "sustained" maneuvering that doesn't eat up fuel to allow US military spacecraft and satellites to outrun suspect adversary satellites — or potentially be able to chase those suspect birds down both to assess any threats and possibly take action to neutralize them.
NATO's planning directorate is creating war games for space activities to work out national contributions, including for offensive capabilities that require allied consensus for use in a conflict.
"We're very much complimentary to the Space Force and to the other services, but we truly do see space as that critical component to set the theater well in advance of phase one operations," Col. Donald Brooks, commandant of the Space and Missile Defense Center of Excellence, told Breaking Defense. "When the first round is shot, the missile is shot, space needs to be there months, if not years, in advance to help set those conditions."
"The expectation is that we will bounce between those constellations in the same flight, so we'll move between them. Now, I don't think anybody should be guaranteeing that on flight one," said AFRL's head engineer for Global Lightning Brian Beal. "We're going to improve as we go and get to that, but that is the goal of the program."
Breaking Defense Europe will launch May 4 with Tim Martin and Elisabeth Gosselin-Malo as co-editors.
Should Vulcan get the Space Force go-ahead, both planned NSSL missions are expected to fly by the end of the year as planned.
A recent memo, obtained by Breaking Defense, has raised concerns that inconsistencies with both joint doctrine and DoD budget organization could create confusion within combatant commands and Congress.
"The stakes are high. Should any one country dominate the commercial remote sensing market, not only could it gain economic advantages, but it would also control the information narrative about the entire planet, from the environment to natural resources to human conflict," the report concluded.
"Anduril will use Apex’s buses for missions where Apex’s off-the-shelf approach and scalable manufacturing enable Anduril to rapidly deliver capability to customers; such as space situational awareness, proliferated LEO architectures, and missile warning and tracking," Anduril said in a press release today.