Space Force Officials Emphasize Speed and Agility, Urge End to Large-Scale Projects.

Defense officials recently testified before the Senate Armed Services Committee’s Subcommittee on Strategic Forces about the need for speed in space to compete with China and other rivals. They agreed that time is of the essence.

Building Smaller Satellites

“The trick is to quit building big,” said Frank Calvelli, assistant secretary of the Air Force for space acquisition and integration. He suggested building much smaller satellite systems using existing technology and completing them in about three years. “Not only will we gain speed, but we’ll do technology refresh dramatically faster,” he added.

“Moving at speed is really important. I think it’s going to unlock things we haven’t even considered yet,” said John F. Plumb, assistant secretary of defense for space policy. He emphasized the need for more tolerance for failures to ensure that rapid development isn’t derailed.

Overclassification

Lawmakers and officials also discussed overclassification as another barrier to speedy innovation at the bleeding edge of space technology. Plumb said that he and his colleagues were collaborating with the intelligence community to eliminate “legacy systems” that hamper cooperation on space defense.

Sen. Angus King (I-Maine) asked Gen. David D. Thompson, vice chief of space operations for Space Force, whether Washington is developing something related to space defense that’s akin to the “Five Eyes” intelligence linking the United States, Australia, New Zealand, Canada, and the United Kingdom.

Space-Related Spending

The Pentagon wants $33.3 billion in space-related spending, while the U.S. Space Force wants $30 billion, up $3.7 billion from its enacted budget for fiscal 2023. Big-ticket space items include a missile warning and missile tracking system comprising a constellation of proliferated low-earth orbit and medium-earth orbit satellites.