The other major announcement from the Walter E. Washington Convention Center in Washington, D.C. was that the Army was canceling the WIN-T Increment 2 program and exploring new network options. This could have both positive and negative implications for the Army as it prepared for more advanced adversaries and works to ensure mission assurance for communications systems in the future. The negative implications could arise from the Army’s apparent attempt to reduce dependency on satellite communications – which were the backbone of WIN-T.

But before we talk about the ramifications, let’s discuss the reasoning for a proposed reduction in WIN-T network usage.

More advanced adversaries means more competition in space

It has been a recurring theme across the entire Department of Defense (DoD) for the past few years – space is no longer the ultimate high ground for the United States military. In the past, the U.S. had space capabilities and satellites as a unique differentiator – providing a distinct tactical advantage and edge over our adversaries. That was certainly the case in the country’s recent wars, where our adversaries had no space capabilities available for their use.

But that’s changed significantly over the course of the last decade. Our largest, most advanced adversaries have proven that they can negate our satellite communications and effectively eliminate our tactical advantage from space. They’ve done this with jamming. They’ve done it with kinetic attacks on satellites as well as through intercepting communications.

The Army – and the rest of the DoD – wants mission assurance and readiness. They want to be guaranteed that their networks are ready should threats arise from these larger, more advanced adversaries – and the steps forward that they’ve taken in space causes concern for the DoD.

This concern is compounded by the trends in IT and technology in warfighting. Every new platform being built, evaluated and implemented across the DoD is network-enabled in some way. This was exemplified by General David Goldfein, the Air Force Chief of Staff, at the recent Air Force Association (AFA) Air, Space and Cyber Conference 2017, who repeatedly asked, “Does it connect? Good. Does it share? Even better,” when discussing the next generation of Air Force innovations.

With every platform being network enabled and with an increasing reliance on IT at the tip of the spear, it’s understandable that the Army wants to take steps to ensure that the capabilities that IT affords are always available to the warfighter. Our increasingly sophisticated adversaries put the resiliency of the satellite networks in question.

More advanced satellites means it doesn’t matter

In my last post, I discussed how the DoD’s acquisition processes don’t always move fast enough to ensure that they’re getting the latest technologies, because technology advances so quickly. Something similar is true in satellites.

Satellite technologies have advanced significantly in the past few years – especially among the commercial satellite providers that are constantly refreshing their constellations by building, launching, and bringing new satellites on-line. Today’s SATCOM providers are launching and operating a new generation of High Throughput Satellites (HTS) that not only deliver higher amounts of bandwidth and higher throughputs, but are also less susceptible to jamming. They’re also operating new constellations in different orbits – including LEO and MEO orbits – that can have a huge impact on resiliency.

Instead of looking for alternatives for SATCOM, the Army should be analyzing new satellite technologies and solutions available via commercial SATCOM providers that can help deliver a higher level of resiliency and redundancy in space, and better ensure that IT-fueled capabilities are always available to the warfighter.

Take HTS as an example. The smaller spot beams utilized by HTS satellites make it significantly harder for them to be jammed, since satellite jamming needs to originate within the beam. Couple that with new, protected waveforms being developed and implemented by SATCOM providers, and HTS satellites can deliver far more resiliency in space than previous generations of satellites.

Increased resiliency is possible via the use of MEO and LEO satellite constellations. By disaggregating satellite signals across multiple satellites and orbits, the Army can gain resiliency. In this situation, the adversary simply doesn’t know which satellite to attack, and wouldn’t be able to negate satellite-enabled capabilities even if they did attack one of the correct satellites, since there would be redundancy baked in.

The increased resiliency of these next generation satellite solutions – in tandem with the incredible bandwidth they can deliver to practically anywhere on the planet – makes it clear that satellite should still be the future for the Army. Especially when you consider the alternatives.

Analyzing the alternatives

If satellite isn’t the answer for the Army, what is?

One of the alternatives – tropospheric scatter (TROPO) – involves reflecting – or bouncing – signals off of the troposphere. TROPO is already in use and has been proven as a viable alternative in satellite denied environments. But can it be an alternative to satellite altogether? The answer is undoubtedly, “no.”

TROPO has restrictions and issues that you simply don’t experience with satellite networks. First, it needs a complicated setup process for each new geographic area in which it will be located – eliminating the potential to do comms on the move. In contrast, satellite networks simply require the antenna being pointed in the optimal direction. Also, TROPO can be drastically impacted by weather and other factors. Combined, these restrictions make it an attractive solution as a backup for satellite networks, but in no way an alternative for them.

Another concept that’s been floated by the military has been the use of UAS platforms to deliver signals. This creates the same issues with resiliency – if not more issues – since a UAS flies low enough to be much more easily targeted by adversaries. Although they’re relatively cost effective and could be deployed in large numbers, they could be easily negated by kinetic attacks from adversaries, making them a less reliable and resilient option.

It’s both judicious and sensible that the Army wants to embrace new solutions that would provide mission assurance for their advanced warfighting technologies and IT. But the alternatives to satellite that they could be exploring are all lacking in some way, and could effectively be less resilient and effective for the Army when they need them most. The advanced satellite solutions available today – and coming online in the very near future – are the best alternative for the Army as it reevaluates and reconsiders the future of its networks.

For additional information on HTS and MEO satellites and their uses for federal government and military operations, download the following resources:

• White Paper: Satellite Evolution Sparks a Service Revolution
• High Throughput Satellites for U.S. Government Applications
• White Paper On O3b “Fiber Like” Satellite Communications for U.S. Government Applications

The post New satellite solutions should be the Army’s answer to advanced adversaries appeared first on SES Space and Defense.

This year’s conference, in particular, was very eye opening, and brought with it some headline-grabbing comments regarding how the Army acquires new products, services and solutions, and the future direction of Army networks. Some of these changes could be very positive for the Army and America’s warfighters, while others could lead to problems down the line.

First, let’s discuss the changes in acquisition.

A new path forward for more rapid evaluation and acquisition
The entire U.S. military – including the Army – has historically struggled with acquisition. The Department of Defense (DoD) and branches of the military have found it difficult to evolve a system that acquired physical items – such as firearms, tanks, boats and planes – to one that acquires services and technologies.

When acquiring physical items – such as planes and tanks – the design, acquisition and implementation process can afford to move at a slower pace. Many of these platforms will be in circulation and service for decades. But services and technologies create challenges – especially when you consider the near-glacier speed of the federal acquisition process. This is something that I witnessed first hand as a Signal Officer in the Army.

Service providers struggle when doing business with the DoD and federal government because they need employees to meet the demands of government customers. Staff up too quickly and have the contract process move slowly, and they’re carrying employees and salaries for a long time waiting for the contract to be awarded. Wait until the award to staff up, and they’re left scrambling to hire the human resources necessary to meet contract demands.

Technology acquisition is similarly impacted by the slow acquisition process simply because technology moves too quickly. Often, by the time a new technology is evaluated, acquired, and implemented, it’s no longer a new technology and the latest and greatest has already entered the marketplace and become the new industry standard.

Satellite acquisition has faced similar challenges. We recently published a Q&A with Maj Gen Jay Santee, USAF (Ret.), who now serves as the Director for Resilient, Affordable Space at the MITRE Corporation, all about the challenges the DoD faces when acquiring satellite services, and the steps he thinks are necessary to overcome them. (You can find that article HERE.)

So, how is the Army planning on changing this? With a new pilot initiative that creates eight interdisciplinary teams responsible for identifying requirements and evaluating new solutions. The concept is expected to help warfighters better inform the materiel planning and acquisition process, while also expediting it to bring new solutions to bear on the battlefield in a more effective and efficient manner.

Although the program is just a pilot with little authority over acquisition practices early on, it is an innovative and interesting step that’s receiving initial praise from senior leaders across government. According to Senate Armed Services Chairman John McCain, “The Army’s decision to restructure its acquisition process and streamline its modernization program is an example of the kind of bold steps that will be necessary to fix a broken system.”

But that wasn’t the only change the Army committed to at this year’s event. The other has to do with their networks, and – if executed incorrectly – it could leave the Army less ready to face the threat of advanced adversaries in the future.

In our next article on the Government Satellite Report, I’ll take a closer look at the impending changes to army networks, and discuss why it’s essential that satellite plays a role in defense networks of the future.

To listen to an interesting podcast on the state of satellite acquisition in the DoD, featuring Jeff Rowlison, the Vice President of Government Affairs at SES Space and Defense, click HERE.

The post A new pilot program may present a challenge for Army acquisition appeared first on SES Space and Defense.

One of the panel discussions at this year’s conference was titled, “Breaking Barriers in Space Operations,” and featured two military leaders with a deep understanding for the new challenges facing the Air Force in the space domain – Brig Gen Chance Saltzman, and Maj Gen Jay Santee, USAF (Ret.), who now serves as the Director for Resilient, Affordable Space at the MITRE Corporation.

During this engrossing panel discussion – which delved into a wide number of topics ranging from the increasingly contested space domain to the evolution of commercial launch – Maj Gen (Ret.) Santee teased that a new and more innovative approach to COMSATCOM acquisition had to be explored in the Air Force and the larger Department of Defense (DoD), calling for a combined and integrated SATCOM infrastructure that combined both MILSATCOM and COMSATCOM resources.

We were intrigued by what Maj Gen Santee was saying, so we sat down with him for a more in-depth discussion about this new approach to COMSATCOM acquisition. Here is what he had to say:

Government Satellite Report (GSR): During your panel discussion (at the AFA Conference), you said that there’s an evolution or movement away from space operators and towards space warfighters. What is triggering this evolution? What differentiates a “space operator” from a “space warfighter?”

Maj Gen Santee: A Space Operator employs a space system to deliver effects to soldiers, sailors, airmen, and marines engaged in other domains. By contrast, a Space Warfighter employs a space weapon system to deliver effects to warfighters while fighting against a thinking adversary.

Since all national security space systems are subject to attack, they will all need to be designed to enable space warfighters to fight through attacks while collecting images, broadcasting PNT signals, connecting satellite communication users, or assessing missile launches.

To address emerging threats to our space systems, we must fundamentally change the way space operations are performed. The mission, function, and task performed by the warfighter and the weapon system must change in the face of these threats.  For today’s space operators, we have a new set of missions, functions, and tasks to perform to control and exploit the space domain and that entails defeating an adversary who is attempting to deny, degrade, or disrupt friendly space capabilities.

For developers, this means we have a new “engineering” problem to solve.  We must add design features to enable warfighting on our space, ground, spectrum and user equipment segments.  It’s similar to the difference between flying a business jet and a fighter aircraft.  When we design these aircraft, we had different “engineering” problems to solve and the result is two very different flying machines employed in two very different ways.

GSR: We often hear that space is a contested environment now and that we need to protect space resources. What steps can the military take to ensure resiliency in space capabilities?

Maj Gen Santee: Air Force Space Command and the National Reconnaissance Office developed a new warfighting concept.  This includes a new concept of operations, new resilient architectures, and new tactics, techniques, and procedures that are all optimized to delivering effects from a contested space environment. It’s both an operational and force development problem, and it requires a top-down, system-of-systems or enterprise approach.

The Department of Defense has identified the elements of space mission assurance and resilience in space. Designing resilient space architectures entails applying these six elements correctly to outpace and defeat the projected threat.  The elements are:

1. Protection
2. Disaggregation
3. Proliferation
4. Diversification
5. Distribution
6. Deception

In each of the space capability areas, these elements must be correctly applied by AFSPC and the NRO to create enterprise-wide resilience.

GSR: What role can commercial satellite constellations – including LEO and MEO constellations – play in delivering this resiliency?

Maj Gen Santee: Commercial space service providers play a key role in today’s architectures and they will play an equally, if not more valuable role in the future. They will serve new roles in enhancing resilience and must therefore be fully integrated into architectures from the beginning. This contrasts with the way we leverage commercial space services today—as supplementing national security space shortfalls.

I also predict a future where the government will seek closer cooperation and partnership with commercial entities.  The government will want “full service” partners who may fly national security payload on their satellites, fly and operate government satellites, distribute government information across ground networks, and provide the government with “full enterprise services.”

In return, the government should consider bringing commercial operators into military planning and operations to include sharing information about space and cyber threats, provide indemnities against wartime loss, as well as traditional monetary compensation for their services.  This type of partnering is only possible if the government and industry plan and architect for it well ahead of actual need.

GSR: During the panel, you said that there needs to be a shift in how the military conducts COMSATCOM acquisition. What is broken in the current acquisition model and how would you fix it?

Maj Gen Santee: When I stated we need to rethink buying services, I was referring to the thinking outlined above.  The threat requires the government and industry to re-optimize our thinking and relationships to defeat the common threat.

This novel approach to acquiring services requires the government to rethink its relationship with commercial service providers.  It requires both the government and industry to approach the relationship in a less transactional, short-term, case-by-case basis.  Instead, both parties need to approach the relationship from a long-term, enterprise perspective where both parties make long-term plans, decisions, and actions in their mutual interest.

The DoD will likely want to do more than lease bandwidth or buy images. In the future, they may want access to SATCOM providers’ networks, satellites, bandwidth, satellite SWaP (Size, Weight and Power), and more.  This long-term, enterprise approach can allow the government to build resilience into its architectures in that it can bring proliferation, diversification, and distribution to our space enterprise.

Commercial providers want a stable investor who can offset risks to their operations and satellites with assurances of a steady cash flow and indemnification.  This can be a win-win for both parties and will require us to rethink our relationship considering the threat.

GSR: Do you anticipate that the new (Air Force) wideband AoA will take positive steps towards COMSATCOM acquisition change? How do you anticipate the wideband AoA influencing space and satellite policy and procedure moving forward?

Maj Gen Santee: I’m not familiar with the Terms of Reference to the wideband AoA.  I will say past AoAs have shown us that trying to make architecture decisions from a single “mission area” perspective versus an enterprise perspective does not yield satisfactory results.

Any AoA going forward must take an enterprise perspective in addressing the threat. For this to occur, the AoA terms of reference should ask for solutions that optimize resilience in addition to schedule, mission area performance, and cost.  If an AoA only optimizes cost, schedule, and mission area performance, I am skeptical we’ll get a satisfactory outcome.

In the case of wideband SATCOM, if the AoA terms of reference ask for the team to take an enterprise approach and optimize all four parameters to outpace the threat, I’m sure we’ll get results that point to the solutions I’ve discussed above.

Maj Gen Santee is not the first person to speak with the Government Satellite Report about reevaluating the COMSATCOM acquisition process. To listen to an interesting podcast on this topic with Jeff Rowlison, the Vice President of Government Affairs at SES Space and Defense, click HERE.

The post A new path forward for COMSATCOM acquisition – a Q&A with Maj Gen Jay Santee (USAF, Ret.) appeared first on SES Space and Defense.

However, even with a solid list of speakers and attendees, one of the most interesting and telling quotes I heard at this year’s SATELLITE Conference was spoken by someone that may not have even been in attendance – Tech Sergeant Justin Perran of the United States Air Force.

TSgt Perran is a Joint Tactical Air Controller, a position which requires him to utilize satellite capabilities to ensure that the actions of fixed and rotary wing support aircraft are as precise as possible. As Maj. Gen. David D. Thompson, the Vice Commander of Air Force Space Command, explained, “[TSgt Perran’s] job – in essence – is to be a scheduler. He schedules meetings between our enemies and American firepower. And he does it continuously. He is the most lethal person on a battlefield.”

I can only speculate about TSgt Perran’s whereabouts during SATELLITE 2017 because I never came face-to-face with him, or bumped into him. He wasn’t a keynote speaker or – as far as I can tell – even a panelist during the event. But he was the star of a video package that was aired when Gen. Thompson got up to speak, and what he said in that video perfectly and beautifully encapsulated everything those listening will ever need to know about the importance of satellite to today’s modern warfighter.

Speaking about GPS and satellite capabilities, TSgt Perran said, “No, I don’t want to be in a fair fight. The advantage is that America’s military is so well trained and equipped that even if you took everything away, we’re still better than [our potential adversaries]. But, when you add all of the capabilities that we have, and add all of the technology, and you get me down to that five minute window, that’s absolutely what I’m going to prefer. That’s because we’re going to win that fight and we’re going to win it so fast that you’re not even going to know what happened. All of my guys are going to be safe and you’re not going to send anymore because you know you’re just going to lose them.”

That’s the kind of confidence that Maj. Gen. Thompson is looking to instill in the warfighter, which he refers to as his, “customer.” And that confidence comes from ensuring that space capabilities are there when they’re needed for the soldiers in theater. According to the General, “It’s our job to ensure that those capabilities are there, on time every single time.”

But Maj. Gen. Thompson’s job – and the job of everyone in Air Force Space Command – is only getting harder. Ensuring space capabilities for the warfighter isn’t as easy as it was in the past, when space was an uncontested domain that could be utilized to the advantage of the United States and few others.

Today, the space domain is changing, and that change was very well articulated by Maj. Gen. Thompson, when he said, “Our adversaries have been watching as well and they recognize now what space does for the American way of war – the precision, the lethality and the effectiveness – and they’ve decided that it’s time to take that advantage away from the United States. It’s only recently that it’s become obvious – not just to us but to the rest of the world – that others intend to deny us that capability in the future.”

This shifting and changing threat environment in space is forcing the Air Force and Department of Defense to make changes as well – both to how they operate in space, and how they construct their satellite architecture and infrastructure.

When it comes to operations and the command and control of space assets, the Air Force is fundamentally reevaluating the role of its airmen and examining what their highest priority and highest value tasks should be. In the past, this included the actual management and command of spacecraft in orbit, but there seems to a shift in that mindset.

This shift in responsibility was well illustrated by Maj. Gen. Thompson, when he said the following:

“For years we have been focused on keeping the trains running on time. Our job now is to understand the threat environment and be able to react to it, and – in order to do that in this current environment – we will not get more uniformed or civilian airmen to do that. So, we’re going to increasingly look at the ability to bring commercial and contract operators online to do the routine day-to-day flying and operations for our satellite constellations while we focus on what we are truly commissioned and designed to do, which is fight [adversaries] through a contested environment.”

The other change involves how the military builds its space architecture. The increasingly contested space domain means that operational resiliency is essential to ensure space capabilities aren’t compromised. By distributing and proliferating systems across additional satellites – including those of allied nations and commercial partners – the military can ensure that an attack on any single satellite no longer impacts service delivery.

According to Maj. Gen. Thompson, “A diversity of options that are space based…will also make for more resilient architecture….Increasing the distribution of [systems] in the SATCOM world and the diversity across bands, across capabilities – both military and commercial – will help us increase the resiliency of those systems as well.”

To accomplish this diversity and increase resiliency, the General proposed increased use of COMSATCOM services, as well closer partnerships with the COMSATCOM industry. Maj. Gen. Thompson suggested that the military look to the COMSATCOM industry for innovative ideas and solutions to the military’s problems. He also discussed a consortium of commercial and industry partners that work together, as well as compete, to come up with innovative new satellite technologies and solutions for the military.

According to Maj. Gen. Thompson, the Air Force needs to, “…recognize the commercial capabilities that are out there…also the commercial ideas for how to operate and field systems and deliver capabilities to our customers.”

To learn more about the shifting role of the COMSATCOM in military operations, click the following links: 

• Changing space domain calls for a new approach to MILSATCOM
• Analyzing satellite alternatives for increasing mission assurance
• The evolving role of industry partners in MILSATCOM

The post Avoiding fair fights – Maj. Gen. Thompson discusses future of MILSATCOM at SATELLITE 2017 appeared first on SES Space and Defense.

<Watch a video of the Defense One Cocktails and Conversations event by clicking HERE.>

Although the event didn’t focus extensively on President Trump and his administration’s impact on space policy, it did bring together senior military space decision makers and satellite industry experts to discuss the future of the US government’s space infrastructure and the constantly-evolving challenges impacting our space assets today.

Participants in the panel discussion included:

• John Hill, the Acting Deputy Assistant Secretary Of Defense For Space Policy at the Department Of Defense (DoD)
• Todd Harrison, the Director of the Aerospace Security Project and Director of Defense Budget Analysis at the Center For Strategic And International Studies
• Patrick Tucker, the Technology Editor at Defense One and panel moderator

The conversation began with a discussion of the GPS satellite constellation and how it’s become so essential for the U.S. military, effectively enabling previously unthinkable levels of precision when it comes to targeting adversaries and tracking friendly troop movements.

With this constellation so important and mission-critical to today’s military, discussion almost immediately shifted to protecting the constellation in today’s much more contested space domain and environment.

The panelists noted that the GPS constellation has some benefits that not every military satellite constellation has. Namely, the constellation – by its nature – degrades gracefully, and there is baked-in resiliency since there are more satellites in the constellation than currently needed. This helps make the constellation more resilient and makes it more difficult to compromise the capabilities it delivers. They also discussed how utilizing other, similar signals and constellations – such as the Galileo global navigation satellite system – could increase this resiliency even more.

This sentiment was echoed by Mr. Hill, who said, “With GPS, you have a distributed capability, it’s also a proliferated capability. It’s distributed in that you only need four satellites out of the 24 from the constellation to get your signal. But it’s also proliferated in terms of the number of satellites we have up there because these things have a way of not dying. The proliferation takes away the incentives of someone trying to destroy them kinetically.”

Distributing a satellite signal across multiple satellites, and proliferating the number of satellites that can be used to carry a signal, are both effective ways to eliminate an adversary’s ability to compromise the capability they deliver. Mr. Hill illustrated this point when he said, “What can I do to reduce the incentives to attack a constellation? I would just assume take the thought out of [an adversary’s] mind because they realize that it’s not going to work since the Americans have multiple approaches to this.”

But the military’s SATCOM constellation doesn’t have the baked-in resiliency that the GPS constellation does. There simply aren’t enough MILSATCOM satellites in the WGS constellation to replicate the level of resiliency that exists in the GPS constellation.

However, there are enough commercial satellites in orbit across all of the disparate COMSATCOM providers and satellite operators to deliver this resiliency to the military.

By increasing the use of COMSATCOM services from its industry partners and providers, the military can effectively replicate the level of resiliency it enjoys with the GPS constellation for its communications satellites. It can even replicate the desired effect of diversifying navigation signals by using other constellations, such as Galileo, by relying more heavily on COMSATCOM providers.

But the benefits of partnering with the satellite industry don’t end at resiliency and redundancy. There is also the benefit of harnessing private industry’s innovation and technologies.

The discussion at the Defense One event took an interesting turn when the panelists began comparing the capabilities of private industry and the federal government. What they concluded was that the private space industry has shifted gears and sped past the federal government when it came to innovating new space capabilities and technologies.

According to Mr. Hill, “[We have] to recognize the point, as technology evolves and democratizes – maybe even commoditizes – that there are pieces of it where the commercial demand – the commercial market – starts driving the innovation. The trick for the DOD is to figure out…where we have ceased to be the innovator and driver, and the commercial side is now that – and how do we capture that and bring it in.”

Noting that the end user – the warfighter – doesn’t necessarily care where their capabilities come from, or who delivers them, just that they work when they’re needed, the panelists agreed that COMSATCOM usage should increase. By leveraging COMSATCOM more aggressively, the military can get access to more bandwidth and deliver more capabilities quickly, while also taking advantage of the advanced technologies that the industry is already embracing.

In order to accomplish this, COMSATCOM services need to become more integrated into the military’s wider SATCOM architecture. That sentiment was shared by Mr. Hill, who said:

We need to figure out how to better take advantage of what everyone else is doing better in space. How do you incorporate the commercial system into your architecture and do it as a more natural part of your process? How do we look at what’s happening in the commercial communications area – with GEO, MEO and LEO – and how do we architecturally think about using all of those things in a way such that the ship on the sea, or soldier in the field, or plane in the sky doesn’t know or care where the communications is coming from, just that the terminal they’re using is working?

Although those questions are still being pondered across the military and DoD, one thing is certain – the commercial satellite industry is now the innovator in space, and the next important step for the military is figuring out how best to leverage the services of commercial providers.

To watch a video from the Defense One event click HERE. To learn more about the shifting role of the COMSATCOM in military operations, click the following links: 

• Changing space domain calls for a new approach to MILSATCOM
• Analyzing satellite alternatives for increasing mission assurance
• The evolving role of industry partners in MILSATCOM

The post Is the role of the DoD as a space innovator evaporating? appeared first on SES Space and Defense.