NEWS AND ANALYSIS:
Space Force intelligence officials said this week that the risk of a conflict in space involving China is a major worry because tests, incidents, or other events could quickly escalate to a major debris-causing fight that would severely disrupt the usability of space.
Brig. Gen. Brian D. Sidari, deputy chief of space operations for intelligence for the U.S. Space Command, told a security conference that one of his biggest concerns is an unintended escalation that leads to a major conflagration in space.
“In the air domain I can see but in space not everybody can see it,” Gen. Sidari said. “So the issue becomes our operations, activities or investment that the joint force is doing … Does that rise up the escalation ladder and what do we do about that?”
Activities in space could be misinterpreted by adversaries.
China has deployed multiple space weapons and has conducted a missile test that blasted a satellite and created thousands of pieces of potentially damaging debris. China also has robot satellites that can crush satellites, lasers that can disrupt satellites and cyber capabilities that can target space controls.
Any tests or exercises involving these systems could be misperceived as impending attacks and set off a war.
To control such dangers, the Space Force is working on “responsible campaigning” — military jargon for limiting damaging space missile tests that could create dangerous debris, such as those conducted by China and Russia. Electronic jamming or laser exercises are also being conducted with escalation of dangers in mind.
The Space Force strategy is called competitive endurance, which seeks to avoid an escalation that could lead to catastrophic debris or other mass effects that would prevent the use of satellites needed for everyday life.
This is a particular problem with China, Gen. Sidari said. “The Chinese don’t believe what we say. They believe what they see. So you have to do operations to ensure they know the boundaries of what’s going on,” he said.
“That helps us control escalation, and if you can’t talk, then you’re just trying to figure it out, and that’s a bad place to be,” Gen. Sidari said.
The Space Force is aware of the danger and keeps that in mind during its exercises and practices to manage escalation so that “each side knows what you’re doing responsibly.”
Chief Master Sgt. Ron Lerch, senior enlisted adviser in the Space Force’s office of the deputy chief of space operations for intelligence, also said that the current “unmanaged competition” with China is fraught with danger.
Sgt. Lerch said that, as during the Cold War, the current period includes a high-stakes competition with China in the space domain that could produce a shooting war that would disrupt satellites and impact a range of uses from GPS navigation to calling an Uber driver.
“We live in a high-stakes world where the last sort of framework or treaty that was signed that had any kind of teeth was a 1967 Outer Space Treaty, and all it said was, hey, no, [weapons of mass destruction] on orbit,” he said.
Today, a variety of space weapon threats exist, both nuclear and conventional, including China’s several types of anti-satellite missiles, directed energy weapons and robot satellites.
The Space Force is preparing to battle in space using what the sergeant called “responsible counterspace campaigning,” which is filling a leadership gap that exists in space now.
“As a military, we want space to be usable by everyone,” he said. “We look at the long-term stability of it as important, and we do not want to take a war to space, but if we have to, we’re happy to go there.”
The two military officials spoke during the Air, Space & Cyber Conference held by the Air & Space Forces Association.
J. Michael Dahm, a retired Navy commander, intelligence officer and former attaché in Beijing, said his past talks with People’s Liberation Army officers were hampered by misunderstandings that were “more than just a language barrier.”
Oftentimes, “we’re just talking past each other, so what turns out to be a signal gets completely misinterpreted,” he said, adding that in some cases “we were trying to signal de-escalation, and they took it as an escalatory signal.”
Trump orders technology policy priorities
President Trump adopted a new policy for aggressively developing advanced technologies, including artificial intelligence and quantum communications, according to a White House memorandum sent to all federal agencies on Monday.
The memo from Russell T. Vought, director of the Office of Management and Budget, and Michael J. Kratsios, director of the Office of Science and Technology Policy, states that America’s science and technology engine is the greatest in the world and needs to stay that way.
As U.S. adversaries pursue whole-of-nation policies, federally funded research and development will seek “targeted, transformational investments in areas such as artificial intelligence, quantum science, nuclear energy, biotechnology, national security technologies and ambitious space exploration,” the memo states.
The government seeks to set clear priorities for industry, academia, and research institutes to adopt.
“Following years of unfocused federal investments weighed down by woke ideology and diversity, equity, and inclusion initiatives, we are realigning the federal R&D portfolio to serve its core purposes: driving economic growth and high-wage employment for all Americans, promoting high quality of life, and ensuring U.S. leadership in critical sectors to our national security,” the memo states.
Among the priorities are advancing critical and emerging technologies; achieving energy dominance; strengthening U.S. security; safeguarding health and biotechnology; and assuring space dominance.
Under a section on strengthening American security, the policy calls on agencies to use targeted investments for “robust and flexible capabilities for mitigating and responding to evolving challenges posed by strategic competitors and adversarial threats.”
New military capabilities to be developed include offensive and defensive hypersonic weapons, unmanned and autonomous systems and hardened national security space systems.
Technology will also seek modernized and flexible strategic and nonstrategic nuclear weapons and capabilities, along with modernized infrastructure.
“Agencies should advance R&D for AI-enabled intelligence collection, surveillance, and reconnaissance, to enable enhanced decision making and situational awareness across all domains,” the report said.
Space architecture development will focus on new and enhanced national security capabilities for warfighters, including autonomous, automated systems that “deliver decisive advantage in conflict.”
Novel military capabilities will also be developed to confront emerging threats in all domains, including space and cyberspace.
Mr. Trump’s Golden Dome national missile defense system was also declared a high-priority development.
New technologies for the system will include sensing and sensemaking, trusted autonomy, space maneuverability, directed energy, advanced materials and affordable scalability.
“Agencies should also closely evaluate how their talent communities and unique resources can align towards risk reduction or capability enhancement activities for Golden Dome and explore opportunities for dual-use applications of the exquisite capabilities that the Golden Dome will afford,” the memo states.
The science and technology policy includes human missions to the moon and Mars.
Agencies will prioritize research and development of space exploration to include long-duration travel and habitation, in-space assembly, local resource utilization, space weather hazard prediction, space nuclear power systems and biotechnology with space applications.
“National security R&D should focus on basic and applied research to unlock currently untenable and transformative space capabilities, including novel sensing modalities, accurate forecasting of the space and near-Earth environment, radiation belt remediation, high-precision chip-scale frequency standards, and advanced power and propulsion systems,” the memo states.
China firm backing pro-Beijing schools
A Chinese investment firm owns a company that runs a large network of schools throughout the United States that critics say could be used to advance Beijing’s aggressive influence operations, according to researchers.
The Primavera Capital Group has ties to the Chinese Communist Party, Chinese state entities and the party’s influence arm, the United Front Work Department, researchers said.
Of particular concern is Primavera’s ownership of the Spring Education Group, which, since 2017, has acquired hundreds of for-profit private schools in 19 states with some 240 campuses and over 40,000 students.
In April 2019, nearly 200 families affiliated with a BASIS Independent School in Brooklyn sent a letter protesting Spring Education’s purchase of the school and expressing concerns about potential foreign influence and student data privacy because of Primavera’s ownership.
Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis ordered the Florida Department of Education in 2023 to suspend school choice scholarships for four private schools owned by Spring Education over Primavera’s ties to the Chinese Communist Party.
Primavera Capital Group was founded in 2010 by Fred Hu Zuliu, a former Goldman Sachs Greater China partner. As of late 2022, Primavera controlled about $20 billion in assets and was ranked among the top private equity firms in Asia.
Mr. Hu has close ties to the CCP but has denied any formal party membership.
He was a delegate of the Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference in his home province of Hunan since at least 2008. The CPPCC is a high-profile political advisory body overseen by the CCP’s United Front Work Department.
The CPPCC charter explicitly requires delegates to “uphold the leadership of the CCP” and to use the CPPCC as a United Front platform.
Congressional investigators describe CPPCC delegates as de facto proxies for CCP interests who often interface with foreign businesses and governments on the party’s behalf.
• Bill Gertz can be reached at bgertz@washingtontimes.com.