Posted late last bread, reposting
U.S. moves to speed military space upgrades under pressure from China, Russia
Jan. 9 (UPI) – The United States will accelerate its space program to compete with China's, a senior Defense Department official said.
Vice President Mike Pence last year announced the U.S. military would create a sixth branch, the Space Force, by 2020 as part of a renewed focus on space exploration, as well as to meet concerns about the country's ability to defend assets in space.
While the U.S. military already is tasked with a variety of space responsibilities – it operates the widely used GPS system, for example – the Air Force Space Command also has stepped up preparations to defend space with its Space Flag series of exercises.
A major part of pushing forward with these efforts, Pentagon officials say, is to first create a Space Development Agency that will focus on defensive capabilities for space-based assets, as well as better global defenses against missile attacks.
"China is integrating certain new technologies and fielding those capabilities faster than the U.S.," Chris Shank, director of the Defense Department's Strategic Capabilities Office, told a conference of the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics in San Diego on Tuesday. "That means we have to be more responsive. China had 39 launches [in 2018], the U.S. had 31, Russia had 20, Europe had eight, and [China] landed a robotic mission on the dark side of the moon – a first."
He added, though, that the United States achieved a milestone of its own, a reference to NASA's New Horizons probe. The satellite flew toward the planet Pluto in December, and on New Year's Day sent photographs from four billion miles away from the Sun once it reached an asteroid in the Kuiper Belt. It is the farthest object ever explored in space.
Shank said the Defense Department is "committed to creating a Space Development Agency."
"China is integrating certain new technologies and fielding those capabilities faster than the U.S.," Chris Shank, director of the Defense Department's Strategic Capabilities Office, told a conference of the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics in San Diego on Tuesday. "That means we have to be more responsive. China had 39 launches [in 2018], the U.S. had 31, Russia had 20, Europe had eight, and [China] landed a robotic mission on the dark side of the moon – a first."
He added, though, that the United States achieved a milestone of its own, a reference to NASA's New Horizons probe. The satellite flew toward the planet Pluto in December, and on New Year's Day sent photographs from four billion miles away from the Sun once it reached an asteroid in the Kuiper Belt. It is the farthest object ever explored in space.
https://www.upi.com/Defense-News/2019/01/09/US-moves-to-speed-military-space-upgrades-under-pressure-from-China-Russia/9781547051575/