On 2 April, a Falcon 9 lifted off from Vandenburg Space Force Base with a crucial payload.
Onboard were the first 10 satellites of the Space Development Agency‘s (SDA) long-awaited
multi-mission constellation known as the Proliferated Warfighter Space Architecture (PWSA).
As the Space Development Agency celebrated the successful first
launch of its planned constellation of low-Earth orbit satellites, director Derek
M. Tournear said on April 5 at the Mitchell Institute’s Spacepower Security Forum said,
“I’m not worried about any physical threats to the satellites themselves. I’m just not,”
He indicated that he is no longer concerned about
China or Russia trying to shoot U.S. satellites down.
In this video Defense Updates analyzes how the US has checkmated Anti-satellite weapons of
Russia & China with Proliferated Warfighter Space Architecture?
Let's get started.
A nation's most crucial resources include satellites, which have significant roles
in both civilian and military communication. Military satellites are utilized for intelligence
gathering, early-warning against missile launches by enemy nations, and providing accurate guidance
to a variety of military assets, such as missiles, aircraft, and warships.
So, if satellites of a particular nation are taken out, it will become handicapped in a conflict.
To accomplish this anti-satellite or ASAT weapons have been developed.
The U.S. was the first to possess this kind of capability. It carried
out its first ASAT test in 1959. The Soviet Union after conducting
a series of 7 tests from 1963-1971 declared its system operational in 1973.
Russia is thought to possess 2 types of ASAT systems.
The first type of kinetic weapon is a DA-ASAT or Direct Ascent - ASAT system
capable of destroying satellites in low Earth orbit, which they have tested multiple times.
The second type is a co-orbital ASAT, a space-based weapon system,
which demonstrated an on-orbit kinetic weapon in 2017 and again in 2020.
In January 2007, China successfully destroyed a defunct Chinese weather satellite, FY-1C.
As per reports, the mission was executed by an SC-19 ASAT missile with a kinetic kill warhead.
In 2019, Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi addressed the nation on television,
announcing that India had achieved a "historic feat" by shooting down
its own low-orbit satellite with a ground-launched missile in 3 minutes.
So as of now, there are only 4 countries - the US, Russia,
China & India have demonstrated this kind of capability.
France, Israel, U.K. are also thought to possess this capability.
The Space Force is changing the cost-benefit equation of space warfare by launching a
large number of satellites through SDA's novel Proliferated Warfighter Space Architecture (PWSA).
SDA’s initial batch of PWSA satellites,
dubbed Tranche 0, will number just 28 which includes the 10 already in orbit.
But close to its heals will be Tranche 1 with more than 150 satellites and Tranche 2 with more than
250. Tranche 1 launches are set to begin in the fall of 2024, and Tranche 2 will follow in 2026.
Tournear said, “We’ll have hundreds
and hundreds of these satellites up there. It will cost more to shoot down a single satellite
than it will cost to build that single satellite. We just completely changed that value equation.”
The Proliferated Warfighter Space Architecture (PWSA) will provide worldwide missile tracking,
beyond-line-of-sight targeting, and high-speed communications. The SDA was established to achieve
these ambitious goals within reasonable cost and schedule constraints, avoiding excessive overruns.
SDA is leveraging proven commercial technologies that were developed
over the last decade to keep costs down and enable fast deployment.
The use of mature technology allows the constellation to
be built in increments that launch every two years, known as Tranches.
The first 10 satellites of Tranche 0 consist of 2 Tracking Layer and 8 Transport Layer satellites.
These 2 Tracking Layer satellites were produced by
SpaceX in collaboration with Leidos who provided the payload. They will perform
the missile tracking mission with their wide-field-of-view IR sensors.
The 8 Transport Layer satellites, built by York Space Systems,
will use laser communication terminals (LCTs) to link amongst themselves and the
Tracking Layer to create a mesh communication network in orbit.
The Transport Layer itself consists of two types; A-Class & B-Class.
A-Class has 4 LCTs and can communicate both with satellites in their orbital
plane and sats outside of it. B-Class has only 2 LCTs and is
limited to communicating in its orbital plane but additionally carries Link-16
transmitters so it can directly communicate with aircraft and other ground terminals.
Viewers may note that with With Link 16, military aircraft as well as ships
and ground forces can exchange their tactical picture in near-real-time.
Link 16 also supports the exchange of text messages, imagery data and provides two
channels of digital voice (2.4 kbit/s and/or 16 kbit/s in any combination).
With additional launches, the Tranche 0 constellation will be ready for a planned
hypersonic missile tracking test in spring 2024.
As evident,
for this strategy to work SDA must keep satellite and launch
costs down while enabling increased performance.
Tournear said SDA aims for a per-satellite cost under $15 million.
He added, “I’m counting on internal investments in industry
to help push this forward. My goal is just like the cell phone model—we will keep the price of
the satellites to the government essentially flat. Just like your cell phone has a certain
fixed price … But the capabilities will continue to advance. So for that same price, every tranche
will give you more and more capabilities for the same price. That’s kind of the model, just like
the cell phone. Basically, the price is flat, but each new model has more and more capabilities.”
If SDA is able to accomplish this, the math will no longer be in favor of China’s and
Russia’s Anti Satellite weapons and this will essentially render them useless.
Technically, the US will have a ‘Swarm Of Satellites’ that will
be prohibitively expensive to be taken out by ASAT weapons.