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.
"[P]roduct development has been slower than anticipated, and the projected date to decommission SPADOC continues to extend further to late FY24, a delay of more than two years from the original timeline," according to the 2023 Annual Report of the Pentagon's Director of Operational Test & Evaluation.
The continuing delays in making the GPS jam-resistant M-Code signal available to military users "increase risk that U.S. and allied warfighters will be unable to conduct successful operations in future contested environments due to the lack of access to modernized GPS position, navigation, and timing (PNT) information," the 2023 Annual Report of the Director of Operational Test & Evaluation finds.
Government can’t stop to update systems, so modernization has to happen without interruptions.
Lars Hoffman, Blue Origin's vice president of national security sales, said that a viable commercial market for space mobility and logistics "doesn't exist right now."
MDA is expected to stage a down-select to one NGI competitor following critical design reviews, now slated for 2025, of both the Northrop Grumman and Lockheed Martin prototypes.
"People need to have a realistic expectation of the demand signal," said Col. Joyce Bulson, who heads Space Systems Command's servicing, mobility and logistics program, stressing that the service is "looking to leverage commercial services to the maximum extent possible, so we're not looking for a significant government investment in bringing these capabilities to bear."
"We can't expect to bridge the valley of death through S&T programs, and industry accelerator programs. ... We need to identify and prioritize resources, funding and personnel," said Diane Howard, National Space Council head of commercial space policy.
As threats rapidly evolve, digital engineering, manufacturing capacity and robust supply chains are critical to meeting challenges.
On Jan. 25, DoD announced that Lockheed Martin and Boeing have each won 15-month contracts worth $66 million to develop a new, more modern satellite design, with the service then deciding on which to use in building the two new MUOS birds.
Northrop Grumman has been working the Space Systems Command, DARPA and the Defense Innovation Unit to develop the capabilities to refuel and service satellites on orbit under several different study efforts.
"Ligado fails to plead any plausible facts to support its purely speculative claim that the Government has occupied its licensed spectrum," alleges the DoJ motion to dismiss the satellite communication firm's suit in US Federal Claims Court.
Firefly is already on contract and will "support a responsive on-orbit mission for the NRO" using the Alpha small launcher and its Elytra on-orbit vehicle for hosting payloads.
Breaking Defense Europe will launch May 4 with Tim Martin and Elisabeth Gosselin-Malo as co-editors.
A new "white paper" from Chief of Space Operations Gen. Chance Saltzman, obtained by Breaking Defense, stresses the foundational role of timely space domain awareness in ensuring that Space Force commanders are not caught flat-footed by adversaries.
"Commercial analytics-as-a-service, or the purchase of analysis vice pixels, means that we can integrate commercial capabilities faster into our existing products and services (e.g., object detection)," an NGA spokesperson told Breaking Defense.
"I would imagine that as Department of Commerce continues to mature this concept, we will definitely want to take advantage of what they're doing," said Vice Chief of Space Operations Gen. Michael Guetlein.
Russia's stance will need to be "baked into" Biden administration "thinking as we look at our own nuclear modernization, our own deterrence measures that we may want to take, and what the security environment could look like after 2026," said White House arms control advisor Pranay Vaddi.