Introduction
New developments with various space weapons
systems are moving them to the front burner of United States military
procurement. With the United
States pursuing a national defense strategy which asserts a priority
for preemptive strikes, concern for space weapons must be a higher
priority for arms control than before.
Within the decade the United States could have space attack
weapons capable of being launched from platforms in space or from
the land, sea or air. The first of such space weapons is likely to come from missile defense,
including space-based interceptors which could be used for offense
as well as defense once they are deployed in space. Also, the Rumsfeld Defense Department has adopted a new procurement
philosophy called capability-based
acquisition. It means
just the opposite of what one might think.
It means deploying systems with little or no demonstrated
capability so as to speed the pace of deployments.
An advantage of this approach from the DOD point of view
is that you don't need a real threat to justify deployment; you
can deploy something just to deploy it, even if it doesn't work
very well.
This new approach is being applied to missile
defense in the President's decision to deploy by the end of fiscal
2004, near Fort Greely in Alaska and at Vandenberg, AFB, in California,
the Ground-based Midcourse Defense system (GMD), formerly known
as National Missile Defense (NMD).1 This new procurement approach is also being applied to missile defense
in space, and to space weapons with attack capabilities as well. The Bush Administration
is now labeling both its ground and space-based initiatives as "an
initial defensive capability", while also calling these deployments
"test beds".2
This confuses policy makers and allows the Administration to have
it both ways, calling these systems "deployments" when
that suits their needs and calling them "test beds" when
a less aggressive posture is useful. Regardless, the intention of the Administration to deploy weapons
with attack capability in space is clear.
U.S. military space funding
Two years ago, Secretary of Defense Donald
Rumsfeld designated the U.S. Air Force as the lead agency for overall
Department of Defense space operations and development. The DOD space budget has increased from $14.3
billion in Fiscal Year 2001 to the Bush Administration's request
for $20.4 billion in Fiscal Year 2004, and is planned to climb to
$28.6 billion in 2008. 3
So far, spending for space weapons with anti-satellite attack (ASAT)
capabilities is still relatively small, in the millions, not billions,
but at the rate the United States is increasing its military investments
in space, the funding for space weapons could soon be in the billions
also.
The Fiscal Year 2004 budget request includes
about $8.5 billion for unclassified space programs, an increase
of $600 million over 2003. 4
Thus, over half of the U.S. defense space budget is classified,
and difficult for the U.S. Congress, non-governmental organizations,
or international bodies to oversee or monitor.
New developments in space weapons
The DOD Missile Defense Agency has put
forward an aggressive program for boost-phase missile defense. Spending on space-based boost-phase activities
is slated to increase from $177
million in Fiscal Year 2004 to $501 million in 2007.
5 Overall spending for missile defenses
of all types is now about $10 billion.
Last December, the Missile Defense Agency
(MDA) announced plans for a new kinetic energy interceptor for boost-phase
missile defense. At the
same event, the MDA also announced that it planned to begin work
on a space-based interceptor "test bed" beginning in 2004.
6 This announcement showed the nexus
between missile defense and space-based weapons, by connecting the
new kinetic energy interceptor for missile defense with space-based
interceptor testing. 7
The announcement followed by just a week the announcement that the
MDA would be expanding its deployment near Fort Greely, Alaska,
of a Ground-based Midcourse Defense system. The nexus between missile defense and space weapons also can be
seen in the substantial - and common - defense industrial base being
employed on both programs. 8
And last summer, the Army Space and Missile Defense
Command began a program to develop small space-based interceptors
that could be carried aboard satellite launch platforms in space.
9 Such miniature kill vehicles on satellite
launchers could be fired against incoming enemy ballistic missiles
or could attack satellites or other space-based targets by crashing
into them at very high speeds.
At speeds of thousands of miles per hour, the kinetic energy
of the impact is as if an explosive bomb had attacked and hit the
target.
The U.S. Army also has an anti-satellite
(ASAT) program, called Kinetic-Energy ASAT.
This program is to develop ground-based interceptors that
could be launched atop existing Minuteman ICBMs or other missiles
to attack satellites in space. As
described by the publication Inside
Missile Defense, "KE-ASAT is an interceptor system designed
to destroy, using hit-to-kill technology, or temporarily disable
hostile satellites."
The fact that there are no "hostile
satellites" and no real threat of them seems not to matter.
While the KE-ASAT program is building satellite
attack weapons that are to be launched from the ground, in conjunction
with the Army's program to also develop space-based interceptors,
the Army's preparations for war in space are undeniable.
In addition to space warfare funding in
the Fiscal Year 2004 budgets of the Missile Defense Agency and the
U.S. Army, the U.S. Air Force received support for generic funding
for research and development of Space Control Technology ($14.7
million) and Counterspace ($82.6 million).
10 Concepts for total space control,
and space dominance, range from relatively "simple" concepts
involving low-cost space vehicles to exotic ideas such as controlling
the weather on the battlefield.
According to one report, "Air Force space thinkers are
studying ways to 'harness the immense powers of the environment'
for military purposes. Putting a yoke on lightning, wind and rain
to turning tornadoes on a dime can keep in check, slow down, and
even halt an enemy’s operations on the battlefield."
11
Other space weapons under development include the Space-based
Laser, the Space-based Radar, a Common Aerodynamic Vehicle that
could be launched into space from a ballistic missile or an aircraft,
and a variety of Directed Energy Technologies, such as high power
lasers and high power microwave devices that could have applications
either on land, sea, aboard aircraft, or in space.
None of these space warfare programs are
adequately explained in the Administration's budget request documents,
and many are scarcely mentioned.
Other space weapons programs are highly classified.
This can create the impression that there are no space weapons
to worry about yet, or that they are so far off as to not be urgent
from an arms control point of view.
Space weapons and missile
defense
Near-term US missile defense is focused
on both theater and U.S. homeland missile defense systems. The theater systems include surface-based (land
and sea) missile defenses such as the Army's Patriot PAC-3 and THAAD
programs, and the Navy's Theater Wide, all of which use kinetic-kill
technology. U.S. homeland
systems include surface-based (again land and sea) national missile
defenses. However, the Administration has declared the
goal of being able to shoot down missiles of all ranges - short,
medium and long, in all phases of their flight - boost, midcourse
and terminal, and to do this from land, from sea, from air, and
from space. The Administration prefers not to use the distinctions between theater
and "national" homeland defense systems, noting, as Secretary
Rumsfeld has put it, that "what's 'national' depends on where
you live".
Each of these missile defense systems will
rely on both Ground-based and Space-based sensors. The US is also focused, longer term, on air-based
boost-phase (kinetic kill, and further out laser) missile defense
capability.
None of these missile defense programs
are primarily ASAT although some will have ASAT capability from
the outset. The prime ASAT
technology is that which would base inceptors in low earth orbit
in space, such as the so-called Brilliant Pebbles program.
A complicating aspect of the debate about
the weaponization of space is the dedication of the current Bush
II administration to deploy space-based missile defense systems
capable of intercepting or shooting down Intercontinental Range
Ballistic Missiles. Land- and sea-based systems capable of such
intercepts would almost automatically be capable of also intercepting
satellites in low earth orbit.
And of course a space-based laser or space-based kinetic
kill vehicle system would have such capability as well.
The Brilliant Pebbles concept, first articulated clearly
and funded in the Bush I administration, also could be used either
for missile defense or as an attack system to kill satellites in
orbit. This system could
consist of some 1500 small satellites in low-earth orbit, with thrusters
on each small satellite designed to direct it upon command toward
a military target. Scientists
at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory and at Los Alamos have
estimated recently that the Brilliant Pebbles system could be fielded
in 3 to 5 years for a cost of $5 to 7 billion.
12
While originally intended as defenses against
enemy ICBMs, Brilliant Pebbles, the Space-based Kinetic Kill system
or the Space-Based laser, if deployed, would be the first step toward
an arms race in space.
Shooting down a satellite in low-earth
orbit is easier than shooting down an ICBM in mid-course that may be equipped with
various decoys and counter-measures. In the case of an attacking ICBM, the defender
may not know the exact trajectory or the nature of countermeasures
used. In the case of orbiting
satellites, they are essentially sitting ducks whose orbit paths
are known precisely and predictably.
By design, missile defense systems are "shooters",
and some will have an inherent capability to attack space assets
as well as defend against enemy missiles.
Missile defenses whether ground, sea, aircraft
or space based, will also involve communications and reconnaissance
assets in space. These capabilities
will also be able to be shifted to offensive purposes. Currently the United States relies on its Defense
Support Program (DSP) satellites for warning of missile launches
and for tracking. The Space-Based
infrared satellites (SBIRS) will replace DSP while adding new capabilities
to discriminate and characterize enemy ICBM targets in flight. Having fallen behind schedule and gone way
over budget, the SBIRS program has been renamed the Space Tracking
and Surveillance System (STSS).
In any case STSS (SBIRS) will be an important part of missile
defense, especially National Missile Defense.
These satellites will comprise a surveillance and tracking
system, not an offensive strike weapon, but they easily could become
part of a larger overall network of military space assets used more
broadly than for missile defense per se. Missile defenses in general will be developing
and will rely on a substantial infrastructure in space, and arguably
this infrastructure would increase the likelihood of an arms race
in space.
Capability-based acquisition
and space weapons
Last December, when President George W. Bush announced
his breathtaking decision to deploy a national missile defense by
2004, Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld explained that at first
those defenses wouldn't be very good.
The capability would not be defined by the classic military
phrase "Interim Operational Capability", namely something
new with proven warfighting worth, but rather capability, as Rumsfeld
put it, "with a small "c". Nevertheless, he said, even at first this new
missile defense would be "better than nothing".
13
The President's decision to deploy missile defenses
is a remarkable example of a new procurement philosophy at the Pentagon
called "Capability-based acquisition."
It means just the opposite of what one might think. For that reason, one news reporter joked that
it ought to be called "Acquisition-based capability." Some have called it "Slogan-based acquisition".
Also, the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs
of Staff has circulated a new draft Instruction on the Joint Capabilities
Integration and Development System.
It officially eliminates military requirements
and replaces them with "capabilities",
and talks about "crafting capabilities within the art of the
possible", "full-spectrum interoperability", "Born
Joint", and - sadly - phases out Mission Needs Statements and
Operational Requirements Documents.
In addition to speaking of capability-based acquisition, you also
will hear U.S. defense officials speak in terms of spiral development or evolutionary
acquisition. The terms
are used more or less interchangeably, and except for the fact that
they all describe an interactive approach for building capability,
no one in the Pentagon seems to know what they really mean or how
to implement them in practice.
The spiral development model originates
with Professor Barry Boehm, director of the University of Southern
California Center for Software Engineering.
In his concept and teaching, spiral development includes
rigorous testing - software testing - as an important and regular
occurrence in each and every loop of the spiral.
Unfortunately in the DOD, spiral development is seen as a
way to avoid testing and cut corners, with successive loops of the
spiral containing little or no testing.
The traditional DOD approach - sometimes called "fly
before buy" - is to wait to procure a new military system until
it has successfully demonstrated that it can work in realistic operational
tests designed to simulate real-world conditions. For major defense acquisition systems, the law requires that full rate production cannot begin until the system has been
through realistic operational testing and the results reported to
the Secretary of Defense and the U.S. Congress. In practice, if the added military utility turns out to be only
marginal, such systems are usually cancelled.
But major military development programs can take decades,
and in an attempt to speed the process, "capability-based acquisition"
was conceived. The idea
is to get new capability to the warfighter faster, and to build
that capability gradually in steps over time. The Military Departments
have used this approach successfully for many years in developing
significant upgrades to existing systems in successive blocks or
models. However, these block upgrades themselves also can take a decade
or more, and so capability-based acquisition aims to further streamline
the process by shortening development times still further, and by
accepting marginal improvements in military value that might not
have been considered worthy of funding in the past.
However, as the President's missile defense decision
shows, "capability-based acquisition" can mean buying
new equipment which has not been through realistic operational
testing, and with little or no demonstrated military utility.
Neither the Ground-based Midcourse Defense system to be deployed
near Fort Greely in Alaska and at Vandenberg, AFB, in California,
nor its sea-based X-band radar, to be deployed on Navy platforms,
has gotten far in its developmental testing, and neither has begun,
let alone completed, more stressing and realistic operational tests.
In fact, the "capabilities based"
approach is a clever way to avoid test failures that might slow
down or interfere with a program, assuming Congress acquiesces,
which so far it has. Additionally,
the "capabilities-based" approach avoids the embarrassment
of having to name putative "enemies", such as Russia,
China or various rogues, present or future, in public before Congress
and the international community.
This, of course, is contrary to the traditional U.S. national
security focus on real threats - both the capabilities and intent
- of supposed U.S. adversaries.
The President's decision on missile defense shows that
"capability-based acquisition" can mean buying systems
whose arms control and proliferation implications have not been
thought through, either. The
significance of the "North Korea Centric" GMD system and
what it might do to provoke North Korea, or particularly China,
to further build their nuclear capability is not acknowledged, let
alone addressed by the Administration. As planned, the GMD system is focused toward
North Korea. And yet as
presently designed and demonstrated, the GMD system would have questionable
effectiveness even if North Korea had the capability to launch ICBMs
at the United States (which it currently does not) and even if North
Korea announced in advance the exact moment of its attack.
Nevertheless, the system is being developed and deployed
as if there were no international consequences whether it worked
or didn't.
The declared goal of the Bush Administration
is to deploy (a) a ground-based national missile defense "test
bed" in Alaska and California by 2004, with a sea-based component
- an X-band radar on a platform- by 2005, and (b) a space-based
"test bed" of three to five orbiting satellites armed
with kinetic -kill interceptors in the period 2008 to 2014.
Even with a "capabilities-based" procurement approach,
these early dates are likely to slip for technical reasons. Further,
Congress may not support them or may severely condition them, particularly
the latter. For example, last May the House Committee on
Armed Services "reestablished a bipartisan consensus on 'fly
before you buy'", requiring the Department of Defense to conduct
realistic operational testing of the Ground-based Midcourse Defense
system. However, this requirement does not take effect
until after the first 20 ground-based and first 20 sea-based
interceptors have been deployed. 14
Also in May, during deliberations in the
U.S. Senate on the Defense Authorization Bill, Senator Jeff Bingaman
(D, New Mexico) proposed an amendment that would have required specific
authorization from Congress before the Missile Defense Agency could
design, develop, or deploy hit-to-kill interceptors or other weapons
for placement in space. However, Senate Armed Services Committee
Chairman John Warner (R, Virginia) developed a compromise that allowed
the program to proceed using $14 million out of the total amount
authorized to be appropriated for ballistic missile defense system
interceptors overall.
Accordingly, the international community
should understand that while the target dates for deployment may
be ambitious goals for the U.S. Executive, compromises in the U.S.
Congress may have little effect on early deployment, once the Executive
branch decides to deploy.
International
issues and opportunities
The ABM Treaty provided very real arms
control restraints on ASAT programs through the prohibitions on
the development and testing of ABM components (sensors and interceptors)
that were sea-, air-, or space based. These constraints ended in
June 2002, and it is utterly unrealistic to believe (or hope) that
any outer space arms control regimes that the US will accept in
the foreseeable future will limit them, with one type of exception.
Missile defense constraints will have to be handled on their own
merits, separately, with the exception being (i) testing or deploying
space-based interceptors, (ii) testing against orbiting satellites
and (iii) testing satellites on targets below (i.e., on the ground
or sea, or in the air). This area of exception should become the
focus of the international community in dealing with the weaponization
of space. It will surely be an area of intense review by Congress.
The Bush administration has announced that
the Outer Space Treaty (OST) suffices for its needs. A prime reason is that the OST does not prohibit
anything that the US is pursuing.
Nuclear weapons orbiting in space are not part of its agenda,
even long term. The Bush administration has been silent on the continuing
treaty constraints on the US in the bilateral START I, and multilateral
CFE which now has thirty parties, against interfering with national
and international means of verification.
NTM is understood to include, but is not limited to, reconnaissance
satellites in orbit.
Given the 2004 and particularly 2008-2014
"test bed" target dates of the Bush administration, leadership
by governments and NGOs alike is needed.
The international community can make progress by beginning
to formulate measures to prevent the weaponization of space. This means additional forums to the CD, which the US is likely to
continue to veto for space negotiations during the Bush years. It could include Track II sessions as well
as intergovernmental forums outside Geneva.
15 It also means practical early steps
that could be taken with the hope that the US might join (e.g.,
space debris mitigation) or not block (such as a UN resolution on
non-interference on non-weapon satellites), as well as preparatory
work that could not be implemented as long as the Bush policies
prevail in Washington, (such as limits on permissible military assets
in space, and allocations of space among various space users).
It would be useful for all to understand that the best is
the enemy of the good, and that step-by-step approaches are likely
to be most successful, even over the longer term.
Such steps could include: (1) states parties to the OST, now about 100, seeking universal adherence
by all states by the end of the decade; (2) cooperative efforts
on debris management and other confidence building measures being
accelerated and publicized; (3) the United Nations General Assembly
(UNGA) adopting a resolution on non-interference with peaceful satellites
in orbit, which would neither be legally binding nor define key
terms such as "peaceful" but would be understood to include
all types of current satellites; (4) the UNGA in a subsequent session
adopting a non-binding resolution banning tests against satellites
in orbit; (5) states parties to the OST convening a review and amendment
conference, separate from the CD, to adopt a formal interpretation,
an amendment or a protocol, prohibiting the orbiting in space of
any weapons, not just those armed with weapons of mass destruction
(WMD); and (6) non-governmental organizations (NGOs) convening Track
II conferences, including governmental representatives, to explore
in detail comprehensive approaches to space security, including
verification measures, a process to keep a multilateral convention
up-to-date with technical and other changes, and an effective compliance
mechanism, all as prelude to a comprehensive, legally binding agreement.
Conclusion
Weaponization of space is not now a major
public concern. Other matters
- such as the war in Iraq and the role of the UN, ongoing developments
involving North Korea, and particularly the Israeli-Palestinian
situation - appear more critical and time urgent.
In addition, there appears to be an understanding, in reality
a misunderstanding, that the potential weaponization of space is
decades away. To the contrary, new funding for space weapons and for missile defense
in the United States, along with a new military procurement approach,
called capability-based acquisition,
is creating an urgent need for an arms control regime for attack
weapons in space.
1.
New Space Weapons Systems are being developed in the United States
and funded by Congress. It is true that funding of space weapons is at present limited,
but this could change quickly if there were another terrorist attack
similar to 9/11, just as 9/11 itself was seen by advocates of missile
defense as a reason to boost missile defense funding.
Congressional support for orbiting space weapons is as yet
untested, and could be slowed by those members of Congress supportive
of NASA and the international space station, and particularly increasing
concerns with the rising budget deficits. Conversely, political
change could accelerate increased funding for space weapons. Arms
control enthusiasts may wish and hope that Democrats in the House,
Senate or even White House in 2004 may slow or even block some missile
defense programs and space weaponization. However, it is plausible, even more likely,
that President Bush will be re-elected with greater Republican support
in Congress. If that were
to happen, the 2008 early goal of the Bush administration for a
rudimentary "test bed" in orbit with three or so satellites
armed with kinetic-kill interceptors would be seen in an entirely
different light.
2.
Missile Defense is the First Wave in which the US would introduce
Weapons with Attack Capabilities into Space. Kinetic-kill
interceptors are now the favorite mode of interceptors of those
supportive of missile defense in the US, and are to be used in near-term
as well as proposed for longer-term programs. Space-based kinetic-kill
interceptors such as Brilliant Pebbles, championed by those who
served in the first Bush Administration and are now in the current
Bush administration, are justified as providing world-wide capability
of "boost phase" intercepts of intercontinental ballistic
missiles targeted on the US. It would be a modest step, indeed, to test
an orbiting anti-missile "test bed" system against actual
satellites in space.
3. Capability-Based Procurement will Shorten
the Time Lines for "Test Bed" and Deployed Weapons in
Space. Since the founding of the American Republic
in 1789, Presidents and Congress have struggled over their roles
in national security. During
the past century the role of the President has steadily strengthened.
The ultimate Congressional strength remains its annual power over
the purse, but strong Presidents frequently prevail even here.
A current example of the tension is the DOD's "capabilities
based" procurement philosophy, arguably an appropriate approach
in time of war. The Bush administration rests its case for
such an approach now on the claim that the US is and will remain
for years at war with terrorism and, accordingly, extraordinary
measures are required. If Congress acquiesces, an issue not yet squarely
faced, then attack weapons with unproven capabilities will be in
orbit sooner rather then later. Once there, it will be more difficult
to argue from an arms control perspective that the US should not
improve this type of technology.
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