US creates new military office for satellites
Saturday, May 26, 2007
*By Andrea Shalal-Esa *
CHINA’S recent shoot-down of one of its own satellites helped drive the creation of a new US military office that can quickly replace or augment American satellites if needed, a top US space official told Reuters on Thursday.
“There’s a realisation that some of these (satellite) assets are vulnerable,” said Col Kevin McLaughlin, director of the new Operationally Responsive Space office, which opened at Kirtland Air Force Base in New Mexico this week.
McLaughlin rejected the suggestion made by some critics that “operationally responsive space” is yet another futile effort to reform military space programmes that have faced major cost overruns and schedule delays in recent years.
“This is not a fad,” McLaughlin said in a telephone interview. “It’s not meant to be a panacea.” Instead, he said, the office has a specific mission to develop, test and more rapidly deploy satellites if existing, bigger satellites were attacked or damaged in natural disasters.
That may mean using less capable sensors to augment capabilities in a crisis, and doing it more quickly than possible with big satellites used for spy missions and other national security tasks, McLaughlin said. The effort could spell new opportunities for defence contractors such as Lockheed Martin Corp, Boeing Co and Northrop Grumman Corp., and launch companies whose vehicles were not large enough for big US spy satellites. McLaughlin is also commander of the Space Development and Test Wing at the base, which launched a smaller satellite last year equipped with sensors for capturing imagery and listening to radio frequencies. Next, it will test delivering data gathered by those sensors directly to commanders in the field.
That satellite was launched with a lead time of just seven months, not the years it usually took to launch bigger satellites, McLaughlin said. “We’re already showing that we can get capability on orbit more quickly,” he said.
The new joint military office was set up with the help of the Army, Navy, Air Force, Defence Advanced Research Projects Agency, National Reconnaissance Office, Missile Defence Agency, and National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA).
Deputy Defence Secretary Gordon England last month sent a report to Congress that outlined plans for the office. “The Department of Defence is committed to improving the nation’s means to develop, acquire, field and employ space capabilities in shortened time frames and more affordable ways. We recognise the need for innovation and responsiveness in delivering space capabilities to all users,” it said. Theresa Hitchens, director of the nonprofit Centre for Defence Information, said the idea of using constellations of smaller satellites to help safeguard US space capabilities - such as communications - was a good one.
But she said the Pentagon needed an overall, coordinated strategy to ensure US space capabilities. The Operationally Responsive Space (ORS) office “is one part. It’s not the be-all and end-all,” she said, noting that classified and nonclassified US military space programmes continued to face cost overruns, delays and technical issues. “ORS isn’t going to go forward if you don’t clean up the other space programmes too,” she said. reuters