By Sun Guangbo and Feng Songjiang
US space exploration technology company Space X officially released the Starshield satellite project dedicated to the government, defense, and intelligence agencies on its official website on December 2. The Starshield will use the technology and launch capabilities of Starlink satellites to provide space and ground services for government customers. The initial cooperation projects include Earth observation, communications, and hosted payload . This means that Space X has completely torn off its "civilian" cloak and exposed its "military" essence. It also revealed the US's ambition to maintain global hegemony and seek to dominate space one more time.
The Starshield plans to deploy more than 15,000 satellites in low- Earth orbit , and it will take three years to complete the launch and networking of all satellites. These satellites have basic functions such as communication, navigation, and remote sensing, and can provide multiple services such as encrypted data transmission and battlefield information perception.
The Starshield provides encrypted private network services and becomes encrypted servers for intelligence. Communication is the main business of Starlink, and its anti-jamming and secrecy capabilities have withstood the test in the Russia-Ukraine conflict. The Starshield may have new improvements in security, delay, bandwidth, and other indicators, and can provide data encryption transmission services for US intelligence agencies, Pentagon and other departments. Particularly, it can provide high-throughput information transmission on the battlefield that the US military has always lacked, thus improving the combat capabilities of the US military in communication relay, navigation and positioning, and precision strikes.
The Starshield is equipped with a laser communication system and can become a switch of the information network. The Starshield satellites are equipped with inter-satellite laser communication terminals, which can transmit information at high speed with satellites or ground stations at different altitudes. They can form a Starshield space-based network with cross-orbit communication capabilities. The Starshield can also be integrated with the satellite network of the military and commercial partner companies to perform data interaction, processing, and distribution in orbit, and can support the rapid closure of the kill chain. This will help the US military achieve a "hybrid space architecture" and enhance its space combat capabilities.
The Starshield strengthens the situational awareness of the US military and becomes a monitor on battlefields. Unlike Starlink, which only uses Space X's dedicated system, the Starshield will be compatible with the interface of third-party payloads, and can carry payloads of different types, purposes, and manufacturers. Other satellite platforms can also be seamlessly connected to Starlink and Starshield as long as they are equipped with the Starlink communication module. Remote sensing satellites used to measure the Earth, communication satellites used to carry space base station networks, etc., can all become "network nodes" for interconnection and interoperability. The Starshield is tantamount to installing networked "surveillance cameras" all over the world. By then, military operations including the launch of ballistic missiles, hypersonic missiles, and fighter jets will hardly escape the monitoring of the US.
It exposes US's ambition for piecing together a "space NATO". The US has signed space situational awareness sharing agreements with many countries and related entities, and signed agreements with Japan, the ROK and other allies on remote sensing reconnaissance and missile early warning to building a "space NATO". Considering that the service objects of the Starshield are not limited to the US military, the space forces of other NATO countries and allies such as Japan, the ROK, and Australia may be able to connect to the Starshield network.
It is not difficult to see that although the Starshield has completed the separation from the Starlink, which has the cloak of "civilian use", it is not only used for defensive purposes as the name suggests. If the technology is mature, it can fully undertake tasks such as the competition for satellite tracks. The conflict between Russia and Ukraine has proved that the so-called Starlink system is not a purely "civilian" project at all. The Starshield project, based on Starlink, further demonstrates the ambition of the US to seek space hegemony. It seriously violates the common aspiration of mankind to use space peacefully and will further intensify the militarization of space. The international community should stay vigilant against the Starshield project.
(The author is from the Space Security Research Center, PLA Space Engineering University)
