The US has begun sharing rare intelligence on Chinese space weapons with British military chiefs.

Secret imagery of satellites has been passed on by the US Space Force, as it seeks allies amid growing fears over a potential space war with Beijing.

Although US officials declined to say which nations the images focused on, they reiterated that the greatest space threats to the West were from China and Russia.

The US Space Force’s geosynchronous space situational awareness programme (GSSAP) began in 2019 and involves the use of satellites to take close-up pictures of other satellites and weapons in space.

Col Ramsey Horn, Commander of Space Delta 9, which is tasked with defeating orbital threats, said on a visit to the UK: “The PRC [People’s Republic of China] is our top concern right now.”

He also revealed that Air Marshal Johnny Stringer, the UK strategic command attache based in Washington, had recently been invited to Colorado to see GSSAP in action.