There are a number of things about these IDIQ contracts that are newsworthy and downright revolutionary for the DoD. First, this is the first time that a multiple award contract model has been leveraged to deliver PLEO COMSATCOM services to the government or military, a decision that DISA claims will, “…deliver capabilities to the warfighter faster and at [a] lower cost.”

The contracts are valued at $32,000 with a $2,000 minimum guarantee to each contractor. However, the total cumulative value of the contracts is $900 million over a period of five years. The government then has the option to add an additional five-year period of performance. Effectively, this gives the services and commands within the DoD the ability to acquire up to $900 million in LEO COMSATCOM services over a period of, potentially, up to ten years.

The 16 different satellite operators and integrators chosen for these contracts include:

• SpaceX
• Capella Federal, Inc.
• BlackSky Geospatial Solutions, Inc.
• SES Space & Defense
• Hughes Network Systems, LLC
• Inmarsat Government, Inc.
• Amazon’s Kuiper Government Services (KGS) LLC
• Intelsat General Communications LLC
• OneWeb Technologies, Inc.
• ARINC, Inc.
• Artel, LLC
• PAR Government
• RiteNet Corp.
• Satcom Direct Government, Inc. (SDG)
• Trace Systems Inc.
• UltiSat, Inc.

But the structure of the contract – as a new approach to acquiring COMSATCOM services – is just one aspect or element that makes it stand apart. The awarding of these contracts for what the military is calling “Proliferated Low Earth Orbit (PLEO) Satellite-Based Services” is illustrative of two major trends that we’re seeing as it pertains to the military in the space domain.

Integrating COMSATCOM
For the better part of a decade, the military has been debating whether to continue investing in its own, exquisite, purpose-built communications satellites or pivot to utilizing those developed and operated by commercial partners. While the allure of fully owning, operating, maintaining, and securing their own satellites delayed this shift, COMSATCOM innovations ultimately made it inevitable.

As Gen. Curtis Michael Scaparrotti (Ret.), former Commander of United States European Command, once told the Government Satellite Report, “Commercial satellite providers are the engines of innovation, providing capabilities today and on the horizon that are quite promising.” It’s this innovation that has pushed commercial satellite operators to expand into new orbits – including Medium Earth Orbit (MEO) and LEO – and has led to the development of new capabilities that could effectively integrate with the existing MILSATCOM satellites.

These new PLEO IDIQ contract awards show that the military has truly embraced innovative COMSATCOM solutions and satellite services, making them readily available to the DoD as an essential tool in enabling connectivity and communications at the tactical edge. They’re also evidence that proliferation into new orbits, frequency bands, and waveforms is seen as essential in the new reality that the DoD faces in space.

Embracing multi-orbit satellite
Once seen as a benign environment where nations could operate safely without disruption, space is now universally considered an austere, warfighting domain.

As Gen. Kevin P. Chilton (Ret.) recently explained at a Mitchell Institute Schreiver Spacepower Forum, “…U.S. Space Command now operates in a domain where threats are on the rise. Adversaries like China are increasingly seeking to contest this domain…[and] their capabilities include everything from ground-based direct ascent missiles, to electronic warfare, jamming, and co-orbital rendezvous satellites.”

In this environment, it’s not enough to simply proliferate satellite resources within one orbit. For true assurance and redundancy, today’s military will need satellite communications that are both multi-band and multi-orbit.

As Ben Pigsley, the Senior Vice President of Defense Networks at SES Space & Defense, recently explained, “Today, the military is facing near-peer adversaries that have demonstrated their ability to disrupt, deny, and degrade our communications networks…Both multi-orbit and multi-band network solutions offer an elevated level of resiliency and increase availability to government customers. Higher availability is critical to the command-and-control networks operated by the DoD.”

Aside from the benefits to resiliency and assuredness, the introduction of commercial services at different orbits has the potential to deliver new capabilities to the DoD. LEO and MEO satellite constellations offer lower latency and the ability to deliver fiber-like connectivity to practically anywhere on the planet – making them the perfect solutions for high-bandwidth applications that may not have operated effectively over traditional satellite connectivity from Geostationary Orbit (GEO).

But now that the DoD has a contract vehicle in place to acquire these services from 16 different providers, what should they be looking for?

Integrate not just operate
Not all of the satellite providers and integrators on the list are identical or offer the same services and solutions. In fact, some of the recipients that received PLEO contracts don’t even operate their own LEO satellite constellations.

So, what should the disparate services and commands within the DoD be looking for when looking to purchase PLEO satellite services through this contract? Here are three considerations that they should keep in mind when evaluating PLEO satellite service offerings:

1) A secure, integrated space and terrestrial network
True end-to-end satellite solutions require more than just space assets – they require an integrated terrestrial and space network that is capable of getting data and information to where it’s needed from anywhere on Earth.

Often, to build a true end-to-end solution, an established terrestrial network will need to be integrated  with multiple satellite offerings. Also, without a dedicated terrestrial network, data often needs to be moved through insecure methods to its final destination – including through the Internet.

If the DoD is going to benefit from PLEO service anywhere on the globe, they need to be working with a provider that can integrate multiple satellite constellations and its own established terrestrial networks to offer true, secure global connectivity that does not require sensitive military data being directed through the public Internet.

2) EM&C capabilities
For the military to have seamless command and control of its integrated space and terrestrial architecture, it needs enterprise management and control (EM&C). As Frank Backes, Senior Vice President for Federal Space at Kratos explained, “[EM&C] allows military and commercial satellite communications systems to be tied seamlessly into the terrestrial infrastructure.”

Any provider or integrator that the DoD considers needs to offer EM&C capabilities if COMSATCOM, MILSATCOM, and terrestrial networks are going to be integrated and deliver capabilities seamlessly to warfighters on the battlefield. As Backes further explained, “Among the goals of EM&C are giving more satellite link choices, reducing resource allocation times, improving bandwidth efficiency, and providing situational awareness to SATCOM.”

3) Experience building global solutions
Building a global, integrated MILSATCOM, COMSATCOM, and terrestrial network, and providing a managed service is complicated and requires both experience and expertise.

In some instances, terminals or gateways may need to be installed to make a global solution work where needed. In other instances, frequency clearances, approvals, and landing rights may be required for a satellite service to be used in other nations.

It’s important that the DoD works to identify the providers and integrators with deep experience and knowledge in building and operating global networks. This is the only way to ensure that the personnel with the connections and expertise are available to navigate these challenges and get networks operating seamlessly.

To learn more about the PLEO contract award from DISA and U.S. Space Force, click HERE.

The post 3 Reasons Why the DISA’s PLEO Contract is Revolutionary appeared first on SES Space and Defense.

During one session at the event, SES Government Solutions’ (SES GS) Director of BD Engineering, Technologies and Solutions, Ram Rao, had the opportunity to address conference attendees on some of the next-generation solutions that are enabling greater visibility into militaries’ technology networks, and discuss how these emerging capabilities can advance U.S. Department of Defense (DoD missions and deliver critical, decision-making information and data at speed.

Network visibility at speed
In the past, the U.S. military has not had a capability to render big-picture visibility of all DoD information, communications, and technology networks. For example, if one branch of the DoD had a network of 500 end-to-end connections, there has never been a solution or means to have a high level, holistic view of all connections in one window for review. And this is a challenge that the U.S. military is looking to remedy.

There is immense value in being able to automatically drill down to individual network connections and dissect each part of an end-to-end connection. If military networks employed such automated capabilities, it would eliminate the laborious and time-consuming legwork of manually monitoring every network connection.

Instead of dedicating valuable manhours that manual monitoring requires, the DoD can employ automated solutions that constantly scan, examine, and provide feedback on all connections. These new technologies can also provide views that scale down to the individual satellite, teleport, and connection, as well as scale up to high-level, holistic vantage points of the entire network. Processes that used to take days of laborious network scanning and monitoring has now evolved into automated near real-time – if not real-time – feedback and visibility of a network and all the connections it houses.

Besting the adversary through real-time monitoring
Aside from the benefits that DoD network operators could gain from an optimized visibility solution, it’s critical that the speed at which mission goals are delivered always remains a priority. According to Rao, “When we listen to all the high-ranking officials, five-star generals – all the way down to the hands-on people – in the military, the one thing they’re talking about is ‘speed of delivery’ and real-time processing, because every second matters when we are trying to defend ourselves or offend our enemies.”

Rao went on to explain that being the first to make decisions in a time of defensive or offensive crises is of the utmost importance to the DoD. The only way high-ranking officials can be first to strike or defend depends on the data, intelligence, and communications they exchange between decisionmakers at headquarters and the warfighters on the battlefield.

“It’s about making the decision first, and who is first,” said Rao. “We don’t want to make decisions blindly. We want to hit intelligently. So, how do you intelligently do it? If every link and connection is up and running, the data is flowing from the end-users to the headquarters, where all our decisionmakers are sitting. Through automated networking monitoring solutions that ensure assured communications and connectivity, they will have real-time data available to them and can quickly make decisions.”

Network visibility and JADC2
Network performance monitoring solutions that grant wider visibility into military networks will most certainly support the DoD’s overarching Joint All-Domain Command and Control (JADC2) project. According to the Congressional Research Service, JADC2 is a “concept to connect sensors from all of the military services—Air Force, Army, Marine Corps, Navy, and Space Force—into a single network.” DoD efforts that support network singularity, like JADC2, can give complete, high-level visibility into a conglomeration of various network capabilities that enable decisionmakers to advance missions.

Overarching network performance solutions that can drill down to individual views and subviews of a singular network connection is game-changing for a concept like JADC2. Allowing DoD decisionmakers to gain visibility into thousands of different network data points in a streamlined and consolidated interface can ensure that the U.S. military is always one step ahead of the adversary.

The soon-to-come ICT Portal
According to Rao, SES GS is hard at work on a soon-to-be-released solution that will deliver those network performance monitoring capabilities to the U.S. military. SES GS’ Information, Communications, and Technologies (ICT) Portal will do just that.

Rao describes the ICT Portal as a spokesperson for DoD networks. “The ICT Portal will be a window that will enable visibility into the network’s capabilities, how it is built, and how it is operating,” said Rao. “This will deliver complete resiliency to military networks, and support the DoD’s JADC2 initiative.”

“The platform will provide visibility on a single pane of glass to government end-users, and give a holistic view into networks from an end-to-end connectivity point of view,” said Rao.

To learn about the role other emerging technologies, such as AI/ML, will play in the future of MILSATCOM, click HERE.

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But why is there such a significant focus on satellite architecture resiliency that it’s one of the Space Force’s largest priorities for the coming year? One only has to look at some of the recent events involving satellite communications in Europe for an answer.

Today’s advanced military platforms and systems are all network and software enabled. These systems require connectivity to function as intended and meet warfighter requirements. And satellite is the best way to provide that connectivity in geographic locations where terrestrial networks are either denied, degraded, untrusted, or insecure – like many of the places where the military operates.

But satellite communications (SATCOM) deliver more than advanced IT capabilities to the warfighter. SATCOM is instrumental for intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance (ISR), and situational awareness. It’s also the main conduit for basic communications services in austere environments.

By distributing military signals over a wide ecosystem of military and commercial satellite resources, it becomes incredibly difficult for adversaries to identify which satellites are carrying military communications and deny them through jamming or kinetic attack.

The near-peer adversaries that America and its coalition partners are confronted with today know that satellite is fundamental and mission-critical for so many military operations. And they’ll do anything to deny access to the satellite services that are both basic necessity and force-multiplier.

We’ve seen this play out in real-time in the current situation in Eastern Europe. As fighting began, one of the first casualties was connectivity and communications from terrestrial networks. Then, the satellite service that was utilized to fill that communications void was almost immediately denied by the adversary.

Regardless of whether this communications disruption was meant to hinder military communications, capabilities, and coordination – or simply to cause confusion and a lack of reliable information for civilians – is secondary. It is evidence that denying satellite communications networks and infrastructure is now a large part of warfare – and will remain so into the future. This is why the military now considers space an austere environment and a warfighting domain.

Augmenting military satellite communications (MILSATCOM) with commercial satellite communications (COMSATCOM) has long been considered a solution for increasing resiliency. By distributing military signals over a wide ecosystem of military and commercial satellite resources, it becomes incredibly difficult for adversaries to identify which satellites are carrying military communications and deny them through jamming or kinetic attack.

Today’s advanced military platforms and systems are all network and software enabled. These systems require connectivity to function as intended and meet warfighter requirements. And satellite is the best way to provide that connectivity…

But what about coalition partners and allied nations with no readily available, purpose-built MILSATCOM architecture? How can they get immediate access to resilient, military-grade satellite communications should a threat arise?

These are exactly the types of situations that a new generation of commercial X-band satellite solutions was made for.

X-band on demand
X-band and military Ka-band satellite communications have long been trusted by the U.S. Department of Defense because of their reliability and resilience. As Patti Aston, a Senior Director at SES Space and Defense, recently explained to the Government Satellite Report, “…X-band [is] considered more reliable – or more mission-assured for critical operations. And when the lives of tactical operators and warfighters are on the line, the military doesn’t want to take the chance that there could be interference or signal loss.”

Access to commercially-delivered X-band and military Ka-band satellite capacity has increased more recently with the introduction of services like tactiXs – an end-to-end managed service that delivers secure, non-preemptible X-band capabilities to customers on an on-demand basis.

These managed services enable governments and militaries without existing, purpose-built military satellite resources to quickly and easily gain access to resilient, reliable X-band and military Ka-band satellite communications at a moment’s notice. There is no special or proprietary hardware necessary to access the service, and no ground infrastructure necessary.  COTS X-band terminals are used to gain access.  Governments and militaries can simply acquire the satellite services they need – for a specified period of time or for a prescribed amount of data throughput – and begin using them immediately.

The near-peer adversaries that America and its coalition partners are confronted with today know that satellite is fundamental and mission-critical for so many military operations. And they’ll do anything to deny access to the satellite services that are both basic necessity and force-multiplier.

“[tactiXs] gives the military user tremendous flexibility and agility. They now have on-demand access to X-band capabilities on an as-needed basis. And they don’t have to buy the capacity on a long-term basis,” Aston explained. “Since [tactiXs] is a managed service, they also don’t have to provide the ground infrastructure. The ground stations and teleports – everything necessary to enable access – is provided for them.”

Resilient SATCOM is as essential to today’s military as any weapons system or platform being issued to – or deployed with – the warfighter. It provides the connectivity for next-generation, network-enabled systems. It enables ISR and situational awareness. And it becomes the backbone of even the most basic of communications services when terrestrial networks are denied.

Commercial X-band managed services can ensure that the connectivity governments and militaries need is available immediately. They also can deliver the resiliency and reliability necessary for mission-critical communications.

For additional information on tactiXs, click HERE.

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Throughout the symposium, the space domain took center stage in panel discussions about the U.S. Space Force’s plan to move forward in modernizing and digitally transforming its network architecture and systems, in order to establish freedom of action in the space domain, while simultaneously being able to deny the same freedom to our adversaries.

In one specific session, “Airmen and Guardians in the Fight,” Gen. John “Jay” Raymond, Chief of Space Operations at the U.S. Space Force, outlined the requirements and measures that would need to be taken to accelerate the change that will lead to U.S. superiority in the space domain.

According to Gen. Raymond, the keys to moving with and innovating at the speed of the ever-changing space race include leveraging the “explosion” of innovation that is coming out of the commercial industry and deploying a new, resilient space architecture that would put the U.S. in an advantageous position over its adversaries.

Commercial industry would strengthen defense industrial base

According to Gen. Raymond, to deliver advanced, military relevant capabilities at speed, the U.S. Department of Defense (DoD) must begin strengthening its ties with the commercial industry and relying more on the technological advancements and innovations that are coming out of the private sector.

“I think there’s great advantage with commercial industry,” said Gen. Raymond. “There’s been an explosion of business going on…We want to be able to leverage them.”

“The big focus area for us this year…is shifting our space architecture to a new, more resilient architecture by the design of the force.” – Gen. Raymond.

Quoting last November’s State of the Space Industrial Base 2021 report, Gen. Raymond stated that the industrial base is “tactically strong but strategically fragile.” To combat the “fragile” state of the space domain’s industrial base, he believes that the DoD should embrace the opportunities the private sector presents to the military and expand the industrial base to more innovative players. Doing so would provide the modern and effective systems, capabilities, and approaches that are required in delivering space superiority for the U.S.

Gen. Raymond recognizes that the role of the space domain has drastically changed since he began his career. Previously viewed as a benign arena, he explained that space is now “the most dynamic and complex security environment in three generations.”

Near-peer competitors like China have spent more than three decades building a space warfighting architecture that has the same advantageous capabilities that the U.S. employs today. “They built it for a purpose,” Gen. Raymond emphasized. “That coupled with the spectrum of threats that we’re seeing from low-end, reversible jamming to high-end kinetic destruction, it’s a different domain. And it requires a different approach.”

The private sector has already created the solutions and capabilities the military needs to protect and secure American assets in space. With near-peer competitors being close to outpacing U.S. capabilities in the domain, relying on the commercial industry would better prepare and position the military with solutions and systems that would defend against the innovations and advancements of our adversaries.

The path to a resilient space architecture

In the past few months, Gen. Raymond has expressed that 2022 is going to be the year of the resilient space architecture for the Space Force – a sentiment he also echoed at the AFA panel. “The big focus area for us this year, and for the next decade, is shifting our space architecture to a new, more resilient architecture by the design of the force,” said Gen. Raymond.

“Our joint coalition forces require the space capabilities that we provide. They can’t be treated as a given anymore.” – Gen. Raymond

“The capabilities that we have in space are exquisite. They’re small in numbers, and they’re not easily defendable. Our joint coalition forces require the space capabilities that we provide. They can’t be treated as a given anymore. We’re going to continue to provide those capabilities and do so in a way that’s more resilient.”

According to Gen. Raymond, warfighting is on the precipice of a major evolution. He emphasized that the U.S. is pitted against adversaries that have – if deterrence were to fail – incredible space capabilities for their own use. “As countries are developing capabilities to deny us our access to space, we can’t take it for granted,” said Gen. Raymond. “And you got to be able to protect and defend it.”

When the DoD invests time and money on the in-house design, testing, and deployment of limited, stovepipe solutions, adversaries who leverage their own nation’s commercial sector have the chance to surpass and deny the U.S. access to its systems and capabilities. Calling back to the need for commercial industry innovation and input, the federal government does not need to reinvent the wheel. The path to a resilient space architecture begins with turning to the existing capabilities and systems that private industry has already created.

Industry is waiting in the wings

The conversation around commercial space and satellite industries’ roles in supporting military innovation in the space domain is not just limited to Space Force leadership. In fact, Congress added a call in FY22’s National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) that requires the DoD to report on its utilization of COMSATCOM services from non-geostationary orbits (NGSO) for delivering connectivity to the warfighter.

Though the NDAA directive doesn’t necessarily signal a heavier reliance on space industry leaders, it does acknowledge the unmistakably growing role that industry is playing in the defense and security of space as a warfighting domain.

In a recent interview with the Government Satellite Report, Gen. Curtis Michael Scaparrotti – a retired U.S. Army four-star general who served as the Commander of United States European Command – discussed how the innovation the commercial satellite industry is critical in building resilient network architectures.

“Commercial satellite providers are the engines of innovation, providing capabilities today and on the horizon that are quite promising,” said Gen. Scaparrotti. Speaking specifically about commercial satellite providers, Gen. Scaparrotti explained, “They are developing capabilities that reduce vulnerabilities and increase the resiliency of networks by positioning, numbers, and capabilities of systems, intra-satellite capabilities, and the flexibility of ground stations.”

Amit Katti, Principal Engineer at SES Space and Defense, shared Gen. Scaparrotti’s opinion in a recent interview about Hydra – SES Space and Defense’s new Common Operational Picture platform. “An integrated [COMSATCOM and MILSATCOM] architecture allows the military to leverage the investments the commercial sector has made in innovative technologies,” said Katti.

“Advanced commercial technologies have added benefits, including increased resilience to interference, jamming, or environmental effects, far more rapid resource allocation, improved situational awareness, and increased bandwidth utilization efficiencies.”

For additional information on how COMSATCOM capabilities can help make the military’s satellite architecture more resilient and capable, click HERE to download a complimentary copy of the whitepaper, “O3b mPOWER for U.S. Government Missions.”

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So, it would be safe to assume that an organization entering a pandemic soon after achieving FOC would experience at least some hurdles and hiccups. But the picture that Lieutenant General JT Thompson, Commander of Space Force’s SMC, paints reveals quite the opposite.

On May 12, 2021, Thompson sat down with the Mitchell Institute’s Space Power Forum to highlight what SMC accomplished during the pandemic, discuss the growing roles that the commercial space sector and international partnerships are playing in the advancement of SMC’s capabilities, and to give an update on the Space Systems Command‘s (SSC) stand up process.

Thompson opened the forum by providing an impressive rundown of all that SMC achieved during the last year and a half. After giving a special nod to SMC for its high performance throughout the COVID-19 pandemic, he reaffirmed, with pride, SMC’s ability to persevere and advance its mission of providing unparalleled space capabilities to joint warfighters.

Despite the pandemic, SMC performed seven national security space launches, completed the Advanced Extremely High Frequency (AEHF) constellation, added two more GPS III satellites to the Position, Navigation, and Timing (PNT) constellation, and awarded the National Security Space Launch (NSSL) Phase 2 contract on-time and without protest. To Thompson, 2020 was, without a doubt, an extremely successful year for SMC.

SMC made further progress through the expansion of the Space Enterprise Consortium (SpEC), by adding its 500th member, as well as awarding a new management contract for SpEC, which was comprised of a 10 year, $12 billion deal. SpEC was originally created “to bridge the cultural gap between military buyers and commercial space startups and small businesses through OTAs.” Fostering the growth of SMC’s relationship with the commercial space sector was a consistent theme that Thompson returned to throughout the forum.

The commercial space sector, Thompson believes, will be key in outpacing the advancement of adversarial counterspace systems. He explained, “I think we need to go bigger and bolder on incorporating commercial space capabilities into the service. We also saw…the increased development and testing of counter space systems by our adversaries, China and Russia. To compete in the space domain for the next decade, we really have to continue to refine our programs and our architectures in ways that allow us to both rapidly and efficiently partner with these new space startups.”

Thompson also underscored the commercial sector’s potential in enhancing and advancing Space Force’s space domain awareness, space traffic management, and weather monitoring initiatives.
He emphasized that commercial markets are driving a paradigm shift in speed, access, and relevance in the tactical battle space, but due to current Planning, Programming, Budgeting, and Execution (PPBE) procurement requirements models, SMC doesn’t have as much flexibility as it should to pursue capabilities and technologies that the sector offers.

“It’s not an acquisition problem,” Thompson stated. “It’s a whole of the Department [of Defense] problem to try and access these commercial things on relevant timelines. We have a lot of engagements with industry. They have a ton of sharp folks who love to experiment, and they want to get after new ways to integrate commercial capabilities and capacities into our architecture.”

Thompson noted that similar to the booming potential the commercial sector offers the SMC, international and allied partnerships’ potential is just as booming. He explained that allied partners are playing an increasingly critical role in the U.S.’ “resilience to and deterrence of hostile and unsafe activity in space.”

In November of last year, SMC held the International Space Pitch Day, which resulted in the awarding of contracts to 10 small businesses across the U.K., Australia, U.S., and India. He gave an exciting update that earlier this year, the awardees presented progress in cutting edge areas such as blockchain, machine learning, and artificial intelligence (AI). He praised the outcomes that sprang from the pitch day event and reported that SMC has received a huge wave of interest from other host countries around the world to participate in International Space Pitch Day in 2022. “It’s a relatively small effort,” said Thompson. “It’s relatively small dollars, but we’re seeing a huge impact from it.”

Another international partnership success story included the memorandum of understanding (MOU) that General John W. Raymond, Chief of Space Operations at the U.S. Space Force, signed with Japan last December. The MOU supports the Quasi-Zenith Satellite System (QZSS) program to host a pair of U.S. payloads on two Japanese satellites.

U.S. Space Force’s collaboration with Space Norway and the Norwegian Ministry of Defense for the Enhanced Polar System – Recapitalization (EPS-R) was another win that Thompson highlighted. The EPS-R partnership enables payload hosting on two Norwegian polar satellites for artic communications purposes.

According to Thompson, the U.S. Space Force is currently discussing and exploring international space acquisition partnerships with Colombia, Peru, Brazil, Chile, and Argentina. Thompson said, “If the global space economy is going to grow as it’s expected…then we’ve got to be able to take advantage of these international partnerships over the next few years, to the mutual advantage of ourselves and our allies.”

Thompson also updated the forum on the stand up process of the Space Systems Command (SSC). In April of this year, U.S. Space Force announced launching SSC to take over technology development and acquisition, which has previously been under SMC’s purview. Thompson reported that SSC is planned be stood up this summer, pending a Commander’s nomination and confirmation.

“By continuing to collaborate with space acquisition organizations and bring them closer into the architectural collaborations that we have, I think that those partnerships will continue to pay huge dividends,” said Thompson.

To hear more from U.S. Space Force’s Lt Gen JT Thompson watch the space power forum on-demand here!

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On April 2^nd, Lauderback sat down with the Mitchell Institute’s Space Power Forum to discuss the successes and challenges of Space Force’s ISR, as well as reflect on the directorate’s stand up process.

Lauderback opened the forum by reaffirming her top priorities as the Space Force ISR director, which include standing up Space Force headquarters, establishing its intelligence center, building up the Space Force ISR enterprise, creating and enhancing the capacity and capability to characterize adversaries, and becoming a member of the U.S. Intelligence Community (IC).

One of her first-year priorities has already been checked off the to-do list. Last January, Space Force was welcomed as the newest addition to the IC, and, as of now, is in full compliance with all IC directives. Describing it as the “first big win,” Lauderback feels that the directorate’s positioning in the IC is “small…but powerful.”

When asked if Space Force would be able to immediately establish itself as one of the more dominant participants in the IC, she responded, “I don’t know that I want to be dominant, but I do want to be on par with other services and with the other agencies.”

As for growing the Space Force ISR enterprise, that will always be an in-process and on-going priority for Lauderback. Throughout these initial months, she has been working closely with Lieutenant General Mary F. O’Brien, the U.S. Air Force’s Deputy Chief of Staff for ISR and Cyber Effects Operations, to ensure that Space Force intelligence professionals are provided the support they need in order to be successful in their respective roles.

When posed with comparing the Space Force and Air Force ISR directorates, Lauderback says that the functions are similar, but the scope and size will vastly differ.

One similarity they share is that they are both members of the IC, and they both must maintain and be in compliance with certain intelligence directives. Also, like the Air Force ISR, Space Force has put a career functional manager in place to professionally develop its ISR talent management framework.

Scope and size are where the two begin to diverge, which, in this case, Lauderback views as a positive during the foundational process. “The other intelligence directorates…are much, much larger than what we will ever be,” she explains. “So, that really helps me to prioritize what it is that we will be able to do on our staff.”

As for challenges currently facing the Space Force ISR, Lauderback acknowledged that there is an inadequate ability to characterize space domain threats with the speed and confidence that is necessary. She explained that detection and assessment of terrestrial adversaries is much more established than those in orbit. “We have it covered looking down. The issue is looking up,” she said. “I want to get after this priority, but we’re just not there yet from a manpower or expertise standpoint.”

To remedy these shortfalls, Space Force will be setting up a Space Warfighting Analysis Center (SWAC) to determine what they have and what they need. SWAC will also be able to ascertain what Space Force will need from a communications and ISR capability standpoint.

Lauderback also addressed the assumption that there is major overlap among space agencies across the various military space enterprise entities. “There’s probably not as much overlap as folks might think,” she said. “Organizations that have an intelligence function and are looking in the space domain…have got a role and a function to perform.” However, she did agree that as Space Force grows, there must be a level of commitment to maintain and deliberately define who does what in the space domain.

Looking ahead, Lauderback is in the midst of planning the launch of the National Space Intelligence Center (NSIC). “I’m excited about this one,” she said. “We have a working group that’s been meeting for a number of weeks now…I am marching towards the goal of January 2022 of actually being able to stand up [NSIC] at an initial operating capacity.”

Reflecting on the past 15 months, she is extremely pleased with her and her team’s efforts in building Space Force’s ISR enterprise from the ground up. “I am very proud of what we’ve accomplished from an intelligence perspective,” she said. “I think we’ve been really successful.”

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Protecting the space domain was a major focus of Brig. Gen. Leonard’s presentation. He positioned Space Force as the organization responsible for, “…protect[ing] and defend[ing] not only allies and partners, but also commercial and civil infrastructure for national security space.”

And there’s a very good reason why space – a previously benign domain that is becoming an austere environment – needs a defender. Capabilities powered by spacecraft and satellites are essential to both the general public and our military’s mission success. A fact that Brig. Gen. reinforced when he explained, “We need to go there to provide a secure environment, a stable environment, and the capability to preserve the American way of life that’s so intrinsically tied to our space capabilities.”

The U.S. military is increasingly reliant on satellites and satellite bandwidth to enable earth-bound missions. As network-enabled operations and military platforms become the norm, it’s absolutely essential for the military to protect this domain.

With the proliferation of network-connected military vehicles and weapons systems, and the massive ecosystem of sensors – including those that generate real-time HD video – for ISR capabilities and missions, satellite services are essential for keeping the warfighter on the ground both connected and informed. This gives our military a distinct tactical advantage over our adversaries.

Unfortunately, meeting the military’s satellite communications requirements has never been a fast and efficient process. The military has long relied on purpose-built, military-owned spacecraft for the delivery of satellite communications to theater – only relying on commercial satellite services to fill gaps in service. This reliance on purpose-built satellites that the military owns and operates both limits the speed at which the military acquires new spacecraft and innovation.

It typically takes years to approve, design and launch new MILSATCOM satellites. During this time, each of the large commercial satellite operators is building and launching multiple spacecraft with new, innovative technologies into orbit. This creates a situation where partnering with commercial operators effectively delivers more advanced and innovative satellite services and solutions than the military currently have available in their own MILSATCOM constellations. Making commercial satellite providers the innovators in space.

Partnering with commercial operators to build an integrated satellite architecture that relies upon both MILSATCOM satellites and commercial constellations will give the military immediate access to the most advanced, high-bandwidth and low-latency satellite communications services available.

The importance of this partnership was expressed by Brig. Gen. Leonard, who explained, “And it’s our responsibility to provide very clear, very warfighting-focused requirements that also harvest the technology and the capability and the ideas that these companies have, and an understanding of where they are going.”

This integrated commercial and MILSATCOM architecture isn’t a new idea. COMSATCOM is more than a blip on the radar across the DoD. And this concept has only gained traction and interest as satellite providers continue to introduce new and innovative satellite services – including satellites in new orbits, such as the SES O3b mPOWER MEO constellation.

With Space Command’s focus and acknowledgment of the necessity of partnerships beyond the DoD and governmental agencies, the promise of these advancements in technology is within reality. “And so, integrating on the commercial side on a very tactical, tangible level is really important…we see very fruitful opportunities as we integrate with commercial entities,” confirmed Leonard.

Embracing commercial SATCOM services as part of an integrated satellite architecture ensures that the latest satellite technologies are available to our military at a time when the need for high-throughput, low-latency connectivity to the tactical edge is more important than ever before.

To hear more from U.S. Space Command’s Brigadier General Leonard watch the space power forum on-demand here!

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But what isn’t as simple is embracing new, disruptive technologies that require a massive change to the organization, its culture, or its way of thinking. The adoption of these technologies and the organizational changes that enable it takes time. It requires buy-in from the highest levels. And it often requires an organization to take risks and doing things that may be uncomfortable.

Cloud adoption was like that – especially within the government and military.

To embrace the cloud, government and military organizations had to answer a difficult question, “Does control only come from ownership?” They had to shake decades of thinking and a deep cultural belief that to truly control and secure something, they needed to own every part of it outright.

For the agencies and organizations that were able to overcome those cultural objections and put aside their need to own everything, there were significant rewards.

The embrace of the cloud-enabled immense scalability, agility, and cost savings. It also opened the door to digital transformation and the advanced technologies that are revolutionizing government. But those benefits came at the cost of making difficult decisions and taking risks – doing things in a way that went against decades of doing business a certain way.

According to Brad Grady, a Principal Analyst at space and satellite industry analyst firm, Northern Sky Research, and the SVP of Global Government at SES, Nicole Robinson, the next logical step in how the government and military embrace satellite communications could require a similar change in culture, approach, and thinking. But – much like with the cloud – if the government and military are able to change “business as usual,” the benefits could be equally immense.

New solutions to meet massive bandwidth appetites
During a recent Webinar for press and industry experts entitled, “The Government Network Architecture of the Future,” Brad and Nicole laid out how the next generation of commercial satellites and satellite capabilities could usher in a new era in connectivity.

During their panel discussion, the two satellite experts explained how embracing commercial capabilities could be the best and most effective way to meet the government’s rapidly-increasing appetite for bandwidth at the edge. What is driving that appetite? According to Brad, it’s a combination of three converging trends – improvements in ISR, increasing communications requirements, and a fundamental change in operations:

“ISR demands are on the rise. There are more sensors on more platforms…within that, each sensor is getting higher and higher resolution. Operations are becoming more real-time, with government and military operators looking to bring collaboration tools and services to the edge. Deployments are also becoming more complex.”

To meet these requirements, government and military leaders need a low-latency, high-throughput satellite solution capable of delivering fiber-like connectivity to the edge – places where terrestrial networks are unavailable, denied, or untrusted.  And those low-latency and high throughput satellite capabilities are not currently available through the military’s own communications satellites.

“There is no broadband, non-GEO government system that is operating today,” Brad explained. “There is no multi-orbit government architecture that offers multi-gigabyte [connectivity] out there today.”

They are available through commercial providers, however.

“…instead of continuing to buy government-owned satellites…take a step back…Instead of spending Herculean amounts of taxpayer dollars to get yesterday’s SATCOM links, partner with satellite operators that are already ahead of the curve.” – Nicole Robinson

Over the past decade, the satellite industry has been investing heavily and innovating new capabilities and solutions. The result has been the evolution of high throughput satellites (HTS) that utilize multiple, more powerful spot beams to deliver higher throughputs and bandwidth. There has also been a proliferation of HTS in orbits closer to Earth than geostationary (GEO) orbit – enabling the delivery of high throughput connectivity with low latencies.

But to embrace and adopt these solutions would require a massive sea-change in how the government and military have traditionally acquired satellite solutions.

From purpose-built to combined military-commercial architecture
Historically, when the government and military wanted to acquire satellite capacity, they commissioned a company to build them a satellite to their specifications that they then launched into space and operated themselves. They controlled these satellites and knew they were secure because they owned and operated them.

Unfortunately, the existing wideband communications satellites that the military owns are not high throughput satellites and they’re all in the GEO orbit. To construct and launch their own HTS satellite at an orbit closer to Earth – Medium Earth Orbit (MEO) or Lower Earth Orbit (LEO) – would take years and be extremely expensive. Utilizing commercial capabilities gives the government and military access to these technologies and orbits immediately, and at a fraction of the price.

“…instead of continuing to buy government-owned satellites…take a step back,” Nicole suggested. “Instead of spending Herculean amounts of taxpayer dollars to get yesterday’s SATCOM links, partner with satellite operators that are already ahead of the curve.”

But that means forsaking old satellite acquisition models and partnering with industry to make COMSATCOM solutions an integrated part of a combined government and commercial satellite architecture.

“Maybe, instead of thinking about who owns it, think about having a combined architecture,” Nicole explained. “It’s time to debunk the myth of what commercial and military satellite should and could do. Instead of having the ongoing ‘us vs them’ conversation, we need to have a ‘we’ view of the world.”

This concept of a combined, integrated satellite architecture is something that senior leadership within the military has claimed to embrace. In fact, the inaugural Chief of Space Operations at the United States Space Force, General John W. “Jay” Raymond, committed to, “…continue engaging commercial partners to evaluate opportunities that may complement or possibly replace portions of a traditional military SATCOM purpose-built system.”

But large changes in vision, culture, and approach are never simple, fast, or easy, and many within the military have concerns that giving up ownership of satellites will decrease security and control.

Much like with cloud adoption, if the government and military can put aside their belief that control can only come with ownership, there are considerable benefits they can realize from embracing commercial satellite. Many of those benefits are a result of satellite operators innovating over time to meet the requirements and solve the problems of their commercial customers.

“Industry has always been out front,” Brad said. “They’ve always been innovating because they have lots of commercial customers that are doing very innovative things and solving very complicated problems that look a lot like government problems.”

To bring these commercial benefits and innovations to the military, and to make this vision of a combined satellite architecture possible, there needs to be a change in how the military works with its commercial partners. This means giving industry a seat at the table, working with them to identify and shape requirements in advance of issuing task orders, and challenging them to innovate on not just technologies, but also on business models.

“The U.S. military is starting to acknowledge they need to do more than just solve the connection – issuing task orders and buying capacity,” Brad explained. “That’s an old paradigm that’s dead on arrival now.”

Cloud adoption was difficult and slow in the government. It took a fundamental change in how government-operated and a movement away from the culture and belief of having to own everything to ensure control and security. However, those tough changes ushered in a wave of new innovation that is revolutionizing government. The same lessons learned from cloud adoption can be applied to commercial satellite. The organizational and cultural changes will be significant, but the access to connectivity and capability that COMSATCOM will deliver could be just as revolutionary for our government.

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In a recent Space Power Forum hosted by the Mitchell Institute, NASA Administrator, Jim Bridentsine, and Chief of Space Operations for the U.S. Space Force, General John “Jay” Raymond, discussed the intricacies of the space domain and the future of space exploration. The two agencies, despite having distinctly separate missions, collaborate and bolster the work of each other, requiring that both Administrator Bridenstine and Gen. Raymond interact and rely on the others’ ongoing work. Together, they have a complete picture of both the current situation in space and the path that the U.S. government and military look to forge in the areas of space domain defense and exploration.

“We share the same goal of having norms of behavior to drive safe and professional behavior in the space domain…one of the things that I’m most proud of in the first nine months of the existence of the U.S. Space Force is how far we have come on developing partnerships with our allied partners,” Gen. Raymond elaborated. “The Outer Space Treaty is a key component of these partnerships. It makes countries responsible for their actions in space and it prohibits national appropriation of areas of space.“

A good example of the necessity of partnerships and space-based diplomacy is the International Space Station (ISS). Fifteen different countries share responsibility for the ISS, and 103 countries have had experiments on the ISS. Shared responsibility like this requires agreements and understandings between the parties involved. As Administrator Bridenstine explained, “We have currently over 700 active agreements with nations all around the world.”

Treaties and agreements between countries operating in the space domain allow for research and development on the ISS, and is opening the door to further visitation and exploration on the moon. This will begin with NASA’s recently announced and upcoming Artemis program, which will send astronauts back to the moon within the next five years. Artemis, in Greek mythology, is the twin sister of Apollo. And this mission will ensure a woman sets foot on the moon by 2024 with the goal of making commercial partnership and sustainable exploration possible by 2030.

This research and development is important for the goals of NASA. Administrator Bridenstine explained, “We have found hundreds of tons of water ice. Water ice is life support. It’s air to breathe. It’s water to drink. It’s also hydrogen. Hydrogen, of course, is the same rocket fuel that powered space shuttles…It’s hundreds of millions of tons of hydrogen on the surface of the moon. Let’s use it.” One of the longer-term goals of the Artemis program is to send astronauts to Mars. In order to do this, research and development of propulsion need to continue. And, now it will be able to be explored from beyond the atmosphere of Earth.

But there is another concern that faces both NASA and the Space Force in the space domain – congestion and debris.

With many satellites orbiting in MEO, LEO, and GEO, and with objects randomly traveling through space from beyond, situational awareness is a key function of the Space Force. “You have to understand what’s going on in the domain around you. And, you have to be able to navigate the precision navigation and timing. And so, all of those things out beyond what we have traditionally operated in, which is geosynchronous orbit and below, now are expanded. Again, this is enabled by a close partnership with NASA,” said Gen. Raymond.

With better understanding of the hazards of space operations, and exploration of new propulsion and sustainability from the lunar surface and the ISS, new horizons may be possible. If threats can be diminished through treaties, and situational awareness can be maintained, and new technologies can be established, once unreachable ideas may now be grasped. “The goal here is to be able to travel to Mars in a matter of months, maybe two or three months, not nine months…” Administrator Bridenstine confirmed.

From the moon, new technologies, and mined resources may give NASA the means to reach Mars and do something once unthinkable. And, it’s through diplomacy, exploration, and partnerships that this may be possible.

For more information about the Artemis Program and the U.S. Space Force, click HERE to watch the Space Power Forum in its entirety.

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A lot has happened since then.

First, there was the creation of an entirely new branch of the military dedicated to the space domain – the United States Space Force. That organization was tasked with recruiting and training a new generate of warfighter capable of defending the nation’s interests in space. It was also tasked with the acquisition of space systems and resources for the rest of the DoD – shifting the authority to assess and acquire commercial satellite and other services from DISA to the new Space Force.

Following the creation of the Space Force, its inaugural Chief of Space Operations, General John W. “Jay” Raymond, issued the, “United States Space Force Vision for Satellite Communications.” This white paper laid out a strategic vision and roadmap to a future SATCOM architecture that is, “…ubiquitous, resilient and dynamically responsive to the immediate needs of U.S. and allied forces.” In a press release accompanying the white paper, the Space Force claimed it would, “…continue engaging commercial partners to evaluate opportunities that may complement or possibly replace portions of a traditional military SATCOM purpose-built system.”

All of these advancements and revelations over the course of the past two years all point to one thing – the creation of an integrated SATCOM enterprise and architecture that utilizes MILSATCOM resources and commercial SATCOM services, together, to meet the military’s bandwidth and communications requirements. So, how close are we to that reality, and what’s standing in the way?

Breaking down the siloes
Unlike with MILSATCOM, the COMSATCOM services that would be integrated into this satellite architecture are offered from a number of disparate satellite operators. And those individual satellite providers represent a collection of siloes that aren’t always compatible. They each have their own constellations, satellites and technologies, and there is currently no way for the military to get a common operating picture. Worse, there’s currently no simple and easy way to roll from one satellite network to another on existing terrestrial hardware.

When we think about the reason driving the military to incorporate COMSATCOM into their integrated satellite architecture, it becomes increasingly apparent why this is a problem. The military needs the capability to rapidly restore the satellite communications that provide a tactical and operational edge if it is ever denied or disrupted. Should an adversary – knowing full well the capabilities that satellites deliver to our military – take steps to deny access to a MILSATCOM satellite, like a satellite in the WGS constellation, the DoD wants to be able to fill that void with a commercial satellite service. But there’s currently no simple way to do so.

If a WGS satellite were jammed right now, there is no immediate way to fill that communications gap with a commercial service without switching terrestrial hardware. With most commercial satellites operating on different frequencies than WGS, with the notable exception of GovSat-1, hardware compatibility between COMSATCOM and MILSATCOM often proves to be an obstacle in the way of interoperability. Beyond terminals and antennas lays the second obstacle of resource management. The lack of a common operating picture would make it difficult for the military to orchestrate services between available commercial and military satellites.

If an integrated satellite architecture that combines MILSATCOM and COMSATCOM is going to be a reality in the DoD, which is what the military has publicly advocated for, then these problems need to be addressed. And that’s why the FMI (flexible modem interface) and EM&C (enterprise management & control) concepts were created.

Small steps towards big change
What may seem like one big challenge – seamless movement or roaming from one satellite constellation to another – is actually multiple, smaller problems. As discussed, there is the situational awareness issue, as well as a terrestrial hardware and terminal issue which both need to be addressed. And, in typical DoD fashion, they need to be addressed methodically, deliberately and conservatively. After all, it’s the lives of warfighters that are in the line.

In an attempt to prove that these siloes can be broken and that the military can get the interoperability and common operating picture that they need to lean fully into an integrated satellite architecture, they’re working with industry partners to conduct pilot programs. These pilot programs seek to isolate the individual challenges and assess the potential collaborative approaches to overcoming them.

One of these concepts or pilot programs involves the FMI. This pilot program seeks to overcome the terrestrial hardware challenge that currently hinders seamless roaming from one satellite system to another. The pilot program seeks to demonstrate the ability to reprogram terminals and reposition antennas on command from the government network operations system to enable the seamless transition from connecting to one satellite system to another.

Three different companies were awarded contracts to demonstrate FMI capabilities. These companies – including Rt Logic, Hughes, and Knight Sky – partnered with satellite operators to build capabilities, hold workshops and conduct demonstrations of the technology in action. All three were successful in enabling roaming between networks. The demonstrations ultimately illustrated that a terminal or network can be reconfigured in response to interference, congestion, or changing mission needs in a matter of minutes as opposed to weeks or months, as is currently the case.

The other pilot program involved EM&C prototypes designed to deliver situational awareness and some command capability to the military. This concept creates standard interfaces between all components of the commercial systems, giving military users the ability to develop a common operating picture for an integrated satellite architecture, and perform some basic management and orchestration of satellites.

Companies participating in the EM&C pilot were tasked with enabling the following capabilities that would empower the military to roam between satellite networks:

• Planning Capability
• Brokering Capability
• Orchestration Capability
• Pool Management Capability
• Situational Awareness Management
• Security Management
• Integrated Data Management Environment

Together, these capabilities will enable the military to register terminals, broker bandwidth and capacity on commercial satellites, interface with commercial operators to configure service, track pool usage and manage both situational awareness and network security. This would effectively enable military operators to identify, acquire and configure the COMSATCOM services that meet their requirements should they have to roam from MILSATCOM resources to COMSATCOM services. This pilot is ongoing.

So, where are we today? We’re closer. Through the wideband AoA and the Space Force’s strategic vision, the military has confirmed that an integrated satellite architecture that utilizes both MILSATCOM resources and COMSATCOM services is the future. These pilots are important first steps in eliminating the large barriers to making that integrated architecture a reality. But we’re still a few years away.

To make this integrated architecture happen, there needs to be a sense of urgency, a focus and a drive within the military that we have yet to see, but is emerging. More funding is needed. More attention and support from senior-level military leaders is necessary. The timing for all of this to come together couldn’t be better. Once it does, the integrated satellite architecture and all the benefits it will deliver to the warfighter won’t be far behind.

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