Press briefing comments by Laura Grego, United Nations, New York
May 19, 2005

		off-site     1996 National Space Policy Fact Sheet

A new National Space Policy is expected in a matter of weeks.  Its directives on the military and security uses of space are unlikely to be drastically different from the Clinton National Space Policy of 1996.  The Clinton policy has been widely interpreted as stressing the use of space for intelligence gathering and other military support activities.  The 1996 policy states, "The United States considers the space systems of any nation to be national property with the right of passage through and operations in space without interference. Purposeful interference with space systems shall be viewed as an infringement on sovereign rights."  However, it actually does not rule out the development of a wide range of other military capabilities, including attacking targets on earth from space and attacking the satellites of adversaries.  For example, the 1996 Space Policy says the "DoD shall maintain the capability to execute the mission areas of space support, force enhancement, space control, and force application." The Bush administration's space policy is unlikely to be drastically different in language and may look very similar superficially.  What is different is the context and thus, how the Space Policy is likely to be interpreted by military planners.

First, the political context has changed a great deal in the last ten years.  The Clinton administration had been widely regarded as hostile to the concepts of weapons based in space and weapons aimed at space objects.  It cancelled the Global Protection Against Limited Strike project, which was a space-based missile defense system—a descendent of the Reagan "Star Wars" system—and it also rejected the Army's ground-based kinetic energy anti-satellite weapon.  Although the 1996 National Space Policy charged the Department of Defense to "maintain the capability to execute the mission of force application," military planners considered ground strike weapons as inconsistent with national policy and did not pursue them. 

The current administration is not only more receptive to the idea of space weapons, a number of long-time space weapons advocates, like the Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld and Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff General Richard Myers, have assumed influential positions.  Strong rhetoric from military planners advocating new space weapons programs has materialized in a few concrete ways: money for anti-satellite weapons programs, space-based missile defense programs, and space-based ground strike weapons programs is now present in the military's budget, although not in large amounts. Rumsfeld reorganized military forces and emphasized the role of space, making the Air Force Space Command independent and headed by a four-star general officer and merging Strategic Command and Space Command.

Additionally, President Bush announced the withdrawal of the United States from the Anti-Ballistic Missile (ABM) Treaty in December 2001, which has freed the Missile Defense Agency to pursue space-based missile defense systems.  The 1996 policy stated that the United States would pursue a program to develop "a national missile defense deployment readiness program as a hedge against the emergence of a long-range ballistic missile threat to the United States; and an advanced technology program to provide options for improvements to planned and deployed defenses."  With the ABM treaty no longer a restriction, ballistic missile defense is likely to be one area where the new space policy will likely have much stronger language.

A second difference in context is that the U.S. military is much more deeply reliant on satellites than it was ten years ago.  Nearly all of the bombs dropped now have been guided at some point in their journey by the satellite-based Global Positioning System.  The military sends tens of times more communications traffic through satellites than it did ten years ago.  Weather prediction and intelligence gathering from satellites continue to be critical to the way modern conventional war is made.  Space weapons advocates currently cite the need to protect these capabilities as a justification for putting weapons in space, although in reality, space weapons are not very useful for defending satellites.  Space-based weapons are more suited to offensive uses than defensive ones.  The 1996 space policy stated: "Consistent with treaty obligations, the United States will develop, operate and maintain space control capabilities to ensure freedom of action in space and, if directed, deny such freedom of action to adversaries."  Without a change in language, this statement could be used to support the development of anti-satellite weapons.

A third difference in context is technical.  The ability to build and operate satellites is diffusing rapidly, and many more countries have abilities and aspirations in space, and this can be interpreted as greater competition and more threats to U.S. preeminence in space.  Additionally, in the past, many of the large space weapons programs, like the Strategic Defense Initiative, were infeasible technically.  There is a belief that advances in technology will permit us to do things that we could not attempt before, and therefore didn't propose before.