Pentagon fielding new tech to knock out Chinese and Russian satellites – Bloomberg

The US is seeking to develop its offensive counterspace capabilities with ground-based jammers

Washington is close to boosting its offensive counterspace capabilities with new ground-based jammers designed to temporarily disable satellites deployed by Moscow and Beijing, Bloomberg wrote on Friday, citing sources in the US Space Force (USSF).

Having tested the new systems earlier this year, the US will deploy 11 of 24 Remote Modular Terminal jammers in the coming months, the USSF told the newspaper. They are all expected to be in place by the end of the year. The jammers are not meant to protect US satellites from jamming; rather, they aim to “counter adversary satellite communications capabilities,” the USSF said.

The Space Force has described the terminals as “small, transportable, and low-cost satellite communications jammers,” designed “using commercial off-the-shelf components.”

The jammers will augment other electronic warfare systems such as the already deployed and much larger Counter Communications System and the medium-sized Meadowlands system by offering a more “proliferated, remotely controlled, and relatively relocatable capability,” according to the USSF. They noted that the Meadowlands system has encountered development issues, delaying its rollout until at least October, two years later than planned.

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These systems will not be “defensive weapons,” but are intended to “attack rival capabilities,” Victoria Samson, the chief director of space security and stability at the Secure World Foundation, said. She classified it as an “offensive counterspace capability,” claiming that the system will be “reversible, temporary, non-escalatory, and allow for plausible deniability in terms of who the instigator is.”

Bloomberg contrasted the apparently offensive nature of these jamming systems with the Pentagon’s usual stance of positioning its “emerging satellite-jamming technology as purely defensive.” They juxtaposed this against the alleged high-altitude electromagnetic pulse weapons the US has accused Russia of developing.

Moscow and other member states of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization are staunchly against the weaponization of space, Russian President Vladimir Putin reiterated to journalists earlier this month. Moscow firmly stands against the deployment of any kind of weapons in space, he said.