Daily Caller
China is making significant progress in weapons that can narrow the disparity in space technology between the communist country and the U.S. a Pentagon official said.
The Asian hegemon is investing substantially into weapons that have the ability to jam and destroy satellites, according to the report. Such weapons can pose an immediate threat to U.S. national security and was one of the reasons provided to establish the U.S. Space Force under the Trump administration, MSN reported.
China’s space weapons development of antisatellite (AST) weapons may possess such means that can be considered “dazzling to jamming, to kinetic kill-from-the-ground, from space — all that, they’re on the march,” Rear Admiral Michael Studeman, the top intelligence official for the Pentagon’s Indo-Pacific Command, said at a webinar.
“They take a look at our space capability and want to equal and exceed those and be able to dominate to guarantee themselves the maneuvering they need to be able to secure their objectives if they’re in a fight,” Studeman said.
China is making long-term investments in weapons designed to jam or destroy satellites as the nation seeks to rapidly narrow the gap in space technology with the U.S., according to the top intelligence official for the Pentagon’s Indo-Pacific command. https://t.co/Wj1lan9DX6
— Josh Caplan (@joshdcaplan) July 10, 2021
The U.S. Intelligence Community was warned about China’s military advancements by the U.S. Office of the Director of National Intelligence (DNI) in April.
The warning stated that the Chinese military will “integrate space services — such as satellite reconnaissance and positioning, navigation, and timing and satellite communications — into its weapons and command-and-control systems to erode the U.S. military’s information advantage,” MSN reported.
The DNI insisted that the development of space weapons will be an integral part of future military deterrence in space, MSN reported. The DNI also expressed concern for ASAT weapons and the need to “field new destructive and nondestructive ground- and space-based antisatellite (ASAT) weapons,” in its annual “Threat Assessment” report.
The report also specified that China has developed “ground-based ASAT missiles intended to destroy satellites in low-earth orbit and ground-based ASAT lasers probably intended to blind or damage sensitive space-based optical sensors.”
The U.S. is taking preventative measures against the threats that China may soon pose. Space Force is constructing a collection of up to 48 such ground-based weapons over the next seven years, MSN reported. The first of such weapons was declared operational in March 2020.
In terms of weapon disparities, Studeman provided an assessment of the future of the development of weapons used in space for our national defense. He spoke of the increase in development by the United States and acknowledged the threat China poses, MSN reported.
“It will be a game of measures and countermeasures and counter-countermeasures for some time to come.”
This news originally appeared in Daily Caller.
