US Expands Military Presence in Space Through NASA and Business Deals

WASHINGTON (Sputnik) - Cooperation between the US Space Force, NASA and the private sector continues to grow as the United States expands its military presence in the space domain, US Space Command Deputy Commander John Shaw said on Thursday.

"Another interesting dynamic in this third space age… is all of those sectors – civil, scientific, commercial and national security – are now interdependent in ways they certainly weren’t in the first space age, and mostly not in the second space age," Shaw said during an interview with the Mitchell Institute for Aerospace Studies. "We rely on commercial imagery now more than we ever have as a department."

US Space Command maintains a symbiotic relationship with the commercial space sector, Shaw said. Shaw specifically praised the use of commercial imagery by news organizations covering Russia’s special military operation in Ukraine.

Both Russia and Ukraine are jamming satellite and GPS systems, with the conflict representing the largest case of "navigation warfare" in history, Shaw said. The US is learning from the situation how to conduct navigation warfare in the future, Shaw said.

US Space Command is "absolutely interested" in the lunar environment as civil missions to the area increase, Shaw also said. The lunar environment is part of Space Commands area of responsibility, which starts from 100 kilometers above sea level and extends outward "indefinitely," according to Shaw.

The command will also be interested in establishing communications architectures in the lunar environment alongside NASA as they and other actors expand their presence there, Shaw said.