Space is the new frontier of war, officials say in change of tone

PARIS — Space has become a war-fighting domain, an assessment that calls for doctrinal changes and the ability to intervene there more quickly, space-force leaders from several NATO countries said at the Space Defense and Security Summit here on Tuesday.

“The rule-based international order in space is nearly over,” said Brig. Gen. Jürgen Schrödl, a division head with responsibility for space at the German Ministry of Defence’s strategy and operations department. “We have to accept that space is a tested domain, is a war-fighting domain, is becoming a war-fighting domain.”

The language is a step up from more diplomatic assessments at the summit last year, when military space leaders discussed growing threats to in-orbit assets, without going as far as describing space as a potential war zone or battlefield.

Global governments in the past two years spent more of their space budgets on defense than on civil space, according to data from summit organizer Novaspace.

Of the $73.1 billion in global government spending on space defense and security in 2024, more than a third was classified, the consultancy says.

“What you see is that it is now the military domain that is leading,” Hermann Ludwig Moeller, director of the European Space Policy Institute, told Defense News at the conference. “This is really clear compared to last year, the language and what is behind the language has shifted.”

More than 200 anti-satellite weapons now circle Earth in different orbits, said Brig. Gen. Christopher Horner, commander of 3 Canadian Space Division. While he didn’t provide details on their nature, he said that is a “shocking number of capabilities” to threaten allied space capabilities including satellite comms to Earth observation.

While hostile action in space is not new, “things are accelerating very fast,” said Maj. Gen. Vincent Chusseau, commander of French Space Command since August. “Space is a really full operational domain, we talk about war fighting in space.”

Chusseau said Russia has a full range of capabilities from satellites for rendezvous and proximity operations and orbiters that pack smaller satellites like a Russian doll, to anti-satellite missiles, electronic warfare, laser dazzling and cyber attacks.

Meanwhile, China is accelerating its space activities to achieve superiority there, according to Maj. Gen. Isaac Manuel Crespo Zaragoza, space commander for the Spanish Air and Space Force.

China was the second-biggest spender on space defense and security in 2024 with $9.3 billion, according to Novaspace data, compared with $53.1 billion spent by the United States. Russia spent $2.3 billion and France $2.1 billion, with Germany trailing in eight position with space defense and security spend of $655 million.

The big change is Germany “finally realized” that space is a war-fighting domain, said Maj. Gen. Michael Traut, commander of the German Space Command.

“Space becomes more and more tactical because technology is there, kill chains need to be faster,” the German commander said. “And if we talk about kill chains, we talk about seconds and minutes, not about creating an informational background for strategic decisions any more.”

Traut provided the example of integrated missile defense, which wouldn’t be as effective without pre-warning and cueing of systems from space.

The German military will design a military space-defense architecture by the end of this year that will be an enabler for multi-domain operations, said the German space commander. The first step will be a “multifunctional, multi-orbit constellation” to be completed in 2029, as well as the associated ground-based infrastructure.

There will be a need for a common space doctrine, for example how to protect allied assets or counter adversarial offensive action, according to Traut. That’s an operational implication that’s arisen in the past one to two years, he said.

“This is still an open issue for us, to develop a common space doctrine,” Traut said. “How do we operate? Who’s going to decide, in what case. and how do we manage our space battles.”

Horner said that while the narrative is changing in Canada, “we are not quite at a place where I can say publicly that space is a war-fighting domain,” joking that his policy officer in the audience was cringing “as I dance around that language.”

Nevertheless, changing language allows to open up the discussion of future defense strategies, including the need to take offensive and defensive action in space to protect critical infrastructure, Horner said. “None of those were conversations that were truly happening a year ago.”

“Beyond the big strategic programs and projects that are underway, how do we maintain a war-fighting edge or decisional advantage when the fight begins?” Horner asked. “And how do we replace capabilities quickly?”

Rather than “giant school bus-sized things” in geostationary orbit, the answers might be “tactically responsive capabilities that allow us to maintain a war fighting advantage,” Horner said. “How do we respond with some immediacy so that we can launch a tactical capability in 96 hours?”

Germany’s Schrödl said responsive launch and being able to “very quickly” bring new satellites into space when they are degraded also has a deterrence role.

He said that at a tactical level, Germany is seeing “a lot of incidents” happening with its satellites, and is observing intentional disturbance by Russia both from the ground and from space, including a lot of temporarily dazzling of observation and reconnaissance satellites.

NATO forces face an asymmetry in the cost of their space assets, with some offensive capabilities being “much cheaper,” said Lt. Gen. Bertrand Le Meur, head of the directorate for defense strategy, counter proliferation and strategic foresight at the French Armed Forces Ministry.

“My guess is that in the coming years we will see many nations being able to develop those capabilities because space is becoming available,” Le Meur said.

“Our space assets are kind of a honeypot, something very expensive, very exquisite,” Le Meur said. “So the figures globally are against us.”

In addition to functional space capabilities that have been used by armed forces for decades, such as Earth observation and communications, there is now a need for operational capabilities “in and for space,” to protect those functional capabilities, according to Germany’s Traut.

“And those operational capabilities consist of defensive and offensive means,” Traut said. “I can repeat that officially. Defensive and offensive means, shield and sword.”

Rudy Ruitenberg is a Europe correspondent for Defense News. He started his career at Bloomberg News and has experience reporting on technology, commodity markets and politics.

巴黎——北约多个国家的太空部队领导人周二在此举行的太空防御与安全峰会上表示，太空已成为一个作战领域，这一评估要求改变作战理论，并具备更快地进行干预的能力。

德国国防部战略与作战司太空事务处处长于尔根·施罗德准将表示：“基于规则的太空国际秩序已近尾声。我们必须承认，太空是一个经过实战检验的领域，一个作战领域，并且正在成为一个作战领域。”

与去年峰会上更为外交化的评估相比，这种措辞更进一步。当时，军事航天领导人讨论了在轨资产面临的日益增长的威胁，但并未将太空描述为潜在的战区或战场。

根据峰会组织方 Novaspace 的数据显示，过去两年，各国政府在太空预算中用于国防的支出超过了用于民用太空的支出。

该咨询公司表示，2024 年全球各国政府在太空防御和安全方面的支出为 731 亿美元，其中超过三分之一属于机密。

“现在主导权掌握在军事领域手中，”欧洲空间政策研究所所长赫尔曼·路德维希·默勒在会议上告诉《防务新闻》，“与去年相比，这一点非常明显，措辞以及措辞背后的含义都发生了变化。”

加拿大第三太空师指挥官克里斯托弗·霍纳准将表示，目前有超过200枚反卫星武器在不同的轨道上绕地球运行。虽然他没有透露这些武器的具体性质，但他表示，这是一个“令人震惊的数量”，足以威胁盟国的太空能力，包括卫星通信和地球观测。

法国太空司令部司令文森特·舒索少将（自8月起担任此职）表示，虽然太空敌对行动并非新鲜事，但“事态发展速度非常快”。“太空是一个完全完整的作战领域，我们谈论的是在太空作战。”

丘索表示，俄罗斯拥有全方位的能力，从用于交会和近距离操作的卫星，到像俄罗斯套娃一样搭载小型卫星的轨道飞行器，再到反卫星导弹、电子战、激光眩目和网络攻击。

与此同时，西班牙空军和太空部队太空司令伊萨克·曼努埃尔·克雷斯波·萨拉戈萨少将表示，中国正在加快太空活动，以期在太空领域取得优势。

根据Novaspace的数据，2024年中国在太空防御和安全领域的支出位居第二，达到93亿美元，而美国则高达531亿美元。俄罗斯支出23亿美元，法国支出21亿美元，德国以6.55亿美元的太空防御和安全支出位列第八。

德国太空司令部司令迈克尔·特劳特少将表示，最大的变化是德国“终于意识到”太空是一个作战领域。

“太空作战变得越来越具有战术性，因为技术已经成熟，杀伤链需要更快，”这位德国指挥官说。“如果我们谈论杀伤链，我们谈论的是秒和分钟，而不是为战略决策创造信息背景。”

特劳特举了综合导弹防御的例子，如果没有来自太空的预警和系统引导，这种防御就不会那么有效。

德国航天司令表示，德国军方将在今年年底前设计出一套军事太空防御架构，该架构将支持多域作战。第一步是建造一个“多功能、多轨道星座”，预计将于2029年完工，同时还将建设相关的地面基础设施。

特劳特表示，例如，需要制定一套通用的空间作战理论，以保护盟军资产或应对敌方进攻行动。他说，这是过去一两年里出现的一个作战问题。

特劳特说：“制定共同的太空作战理论仍然是我们面临的一个开放性问题。我们如何作战？在什么情况下由谁来决定？以及我们如何管理太空作战。”

霍纳表示，虽然加拿大的舆论正在发生变化，“但我们还不能公开说太空是战争领域”，他还开玩笑说，当他在台下含糊其辞地使用这个词时，他的政策官员感到很尴尬。

霍纳表示，尽管如此，改变措辞有助于开启关于未来防御战略的讨论，包括在太空采取进攻和防御行动以保护关键基础设施的必要性。“一年前，这些讨论都还不存在。”

霍纳问道：“除了正在进行的大型战略计划和项目之外，当战争开始时，我们如何保持作战优势或决策优势？我们又该如何快速补充作战能力？”

霍纳说，答案或许不是在地球同步轨道上部署“巨型校车大小的物体”，而是“能够让我们保持作战优势的战术响应能力”。“我们如何才能迅速做出反应，以便在96小时内发射战术能力？”

德国的施罗德表示，快速响应的发射能力以及在卫星性能下降时能够“非常迅速地”将新卫星送入太空的能力也具有威慑作用。

他表示，从战术层面来看，德国的卫星正遭受“大量事件”的干扰，并观察到俄罗斯从地面和太空进行的蓄意干扰，包括对许多观测和侦察卫星进行暂时性眩目。

法国武装部队部国防战略、反扩散和战略远见司司长贝特朗·勒默尔中将表示，北约部队在太空资产成本方面面临不对称性，一些进攻性能力“便宜得多”。

“我猜测，未来几年我们将看到许多国家能够发展这些能力，因为太空正在变得可用，”勒默尔说。

勒默尔说：“我们的太空资产就像一个诱饵，非常昂贵，非常珍贵。所以，全球的数据对我们不利。”

德国的特劳特表示，除了武装部队几十年来一直在使用的功能性太空能力（如地球观测和通信）之外，现在还需要“在太空中和为太空服务”的作战能力来保护这些功能性能力。

特劳特说：“这些作战能力包括防御和进攻手段。我可以正式重申这一点：防御和进攻手段，盾牌和利剑。”

鲁迪·鲁伊滕贝格是《防务新闻》的欧洲记者。他的职业生涯始于彭博新闻社，拥有报道科技、大宗商品市场和政治方面的经验。