You must remember when American President Donald Trump claimed to create a Space Force. And everyone including me laughs on that statement. Well, for your surprise it was not a joke as that Space Force will be here sooner rather than later.
Recently, Vice President Mike Pence laid out the administration’s plans in a morning speech at the Pentagon saying that the Space Force may be established as soon as 2020.
“As President Trump has said, in his words, it is not enough to merely have an American presence in space — we must have American dominance in space. And so we will,” Pence said to attendees.
“Space is, in his words, a war-fighting domain just like land and air and sea.” He added.
A report of Department of Defense released on 9 August, the Space Force would be the 6th division of the military, in order to protect United States security interests in space.
Its aim would be “to deter and if necessary degrade, deny, disrupt, destroy, and manipulate adversary capabilities to protect U.S. interests, assets, and way of life.”
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A few of these approaches would entail the development and use of anti-satellite weapons, communications jamming technologies, and improvements to the U.S. radar and GPS systems.
According to Pence, the Space Force would be created from the restructuring of pre-existing space programs and personnel. Moreover, it would be designed to react to efforts by countries such as Russia and China, who have already stepped up efforts to build up space weapons.
“As their actions make clear, our adversaries have transformed space into a war-fighting domain already, and the United States will not shrink from this challenge,” Pence made it clear in his statement.
As per the detail of the report, three different agencies coming under the Space Force umbrella:
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- The Space Development Agency
- The Space Operations Force
- Services and Support and the Space Command
It would be led by a four-star general. Due to the fact, the creation of a new military branch requires Congressional authorization; plans are to officially demand the establishment within the 2020 budget.
Well, the timing seems fairly perfect. Given the fact that likely Trump plans to make his Space Force plans the main part of his 2020 re-election campaign.
On the other hand, when Trump presented his idea for a new American branch of the military in space, it was met with a mishmash of excitement, fright, and mockery.
Pro-military analysts lauded it as a way to protect our increasing dependence on technology, much of which is served from satellites in space. But others have criticized the plan as wasteful.
Former NASA astronaut Capt. Mark Kelly commented on this, “It doesn’t make sense to build a whole other level of bureaucracy in an incredibly bureaucratic DoD”.
His point was that the Air Force Space Command is already doing much of the Space Force’s work. So what’s the point to create a new force in the space?
How do you see this step of the American president? State your precious opinion about this matter in the comments section.
