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The newest development in the escalating extraterrestrial competition between superpowers is the launch this summer of a constellation of satellites by the US Space Force to monitor Chinese or Russian spacecraft that might be able to damage or destroy orbiting objects.
The network, code-named “Silent Barker,” would be the first of its type to support earth-based sensors and low-earth orbit satellites, according to the Space Force and experts. The satellites will be positioned in geosynchronous orbit, which is 22,000 miles (35,400 km) above the Earth and at the same rotational speed as the planet.
The Space Force, which is developing the satellites with the National Reconnaissance Office, said in a statement that “this capability enables indications and warnings of threats” against high-value US systems and will “provide capabilities to search, detect, and track objects from space for timely threat detection.”
According to a statement from the NRO, the United Launch Alliance, a joint venture between Boeing Co. and Lockheed Martin Corp., plans to launch the Silent Barker satellite network on an Atlas V launcher sometime after July. An agency that has been around for years but whose existence wasn’t made public until 1992 will now publicise the launch date 30 days in advance on Facebook and Twitter.
A growing concern for the US, Silent Barker is a response to Chinese and Russian efforts to create devices that can be deployed into orbit and destroy other satellites.
Sarah Mineiro, a former chief staffer on the House Armed Services Committee strategic subcommittee that regulates space programmes, said the new constellation “will dramatically increase Space Force’s ability to track on-orbit, adversary satellites that could be manoeuvring around or in close proximity to our satellites.”
Satellites in Conflict
By overcoming the restrictions of ground-based or lower-orbit surveillance devices, Silent Barker enables the US to “really figure out what is going on up there in space,” as she put it.
The Office of the Director of National Intelligence stated in its annual threat assessment this year that China has weaponry designed to attack US and allies’ satellites, and that “counterspace operations will be integral to potential PLA military campaigns.” The Office of the Director of National Intelligence is referring to the People’s Liberation Army.
China’s SJ-21 satellite, which was launched in 2021 and subsequently successfully towed a retired Chinese satellite a few hundred miles into a higher orbit, is one example. The Sijian-17, a different Chinese spacecraft, has a robotic arm that “could be used for grappling other satellites,” according to a 2022 Defence Intelligence Agency study.
The chief of the US Space Command, Gen. James Dickinson, stated in March hearing before Congress that the SJ-21 “could clearly serve in a counterspace role and hold our geosynchronous satellites at risk.”The SJ-21 is the kind of satellite that Silent Barker would monitor in an effort “to detect or discover new objects,” according to Space Force.
The Silent Barker constellation will consist of an unspecified number of satellites, however the Space Force and NRO only disclosed that “multiple space vehicles” will be utilised.
The Space Force stated that satellite surveillance complements ground sensors and “overcomes ground sensor limitations by providing timely 24-hour above-the-weather collection of satellite data.” However, “Silent Barker will close observation gaps,” it claimed. Ground-based sensors of objects in geosynchronous orbit “are constrained by distance, geography, and weather.”
