Over the last two years, the about how best to organize U.S. Military space activities has intensified and received significantly more political attention, in large part because of President Donald Trump’s call for the creation of a separate space force. The rhetoric used to advocate for or against a space force unfortunately gives the impression that a “space war” will involve Hollywood-esque scenes of satellites shooting laser cannons at each other, killer robot satellites locked in close combat, and space marines invading space stations and habitats. The reality is, however, that space will be part of future conflicts on Earth, as the critical role space-based capabilities such as satellite communications, intelligence, and navigation play in supporting and integrating with terrestrial military operations will only grow.

As a result, space capabilities will increasingly become military targets and subject to a variety of.While hopefully such a scenario will never come to pass, the fact remains that space will be a of military activity and it is therefore critical that U.S. Policymakers get the organizational structures for those activities right. The conventional wisdom is that a separate unified combatant command for space, namely the U.S. Space Command that previously existed from 1985 to 2001, is a sensible decision, but splitting off current Air Force, Army, and Navy service-level efforts into a separate space force might cause more problems than it solves. A deeper dive shows the case is likely the exact opposite: establishing a space force with the right culture is likely to yield more benefits for the United States and avoid creating more overhead and complications, while bringing back U.S.

Space Command may make things worse.Understanding why this is the case requires a quick dive into how the U.S. Military is organized.

Military can be thought of as having two separate organizational structures. One structure comprises the (the Army, Navy, Air Force, Marines, and Coast Guard). They are for recruiting new servicemembers, acquiring and developing new capabilities, and training servicemembers to operate those capabilities. Creating a U.S. Space Command that is culturally biased towards focusing on space as a separate warfighting domain, as opposed to space being part of a broader military picture that incorporates terrestrial military operations, would make things worse. Many of the most vocal military proponents of bringing back U.S.

Space Command about the need to fight future battles in space itself and the importance of space as the “ultimate high ground,” while seeming less interested in how space capabilities support warfighting on Earth. While it may theoretically happen at some point decades from now, there’s no practical scenario in the near future of a “space war” that is completely dissociated from a terrestrial crisis or conflict. China has recognized this, as shown by their recent of a Strategic Support Force that integrates space, electronic warfare, and cyber capabilities under a single military command, which is now taking part in military exercises.Instead of rushing to bring back U.S. Space Command, the focus should instead be on increasing the number of space domain experts who are integrated into the existing regional combatant commands. Over the last several years, changes in Strategic Command policy for filling personnel billets have actually gone the other direction, in that fewer space domain experts are integrated into the combatant commands.

This should be reversed. The current dearth of space domain experts integrated into combatant commands is tied to a broader shortage of such experts across the military. According to servicemembers who have recently filled such positions, only 65 percent of space billets at U.S.

The former U.S. Space Command, which is now part of the U.S. Strategic Command as of June 2002, doesn't hide the fact that it wants to establish U.S. Supremacy in space. In its Vision for 2020 report, the Space Command points out that military forces have always evolved to protect national interests, both military and economic. The report suggests that space weapons must be developed to.

Strategic Command are currently filled because of this shortage. Many more space experts need to be trained before resurrecting U.S. Space Command should even be considered.”The need to train those space domain experts is why establishing a space force should precede a U.S. Space Command.

Although I was of Trump’s original demand for a space force, the developed by the Pentagon is pragmatic and sensible. That’s in large part because the Pentagon’s plan is not actually to create the “” space force the president called for, but rather to establish a modified version of the space corps within the Department of the Air Force that Rep. Mike Rogers two years ago. The of the National Defense Authorization Act for FY 2020 from both the House and Senate also point towards the creation of a space corps, although the Senate bill still calls it a space force.Creating a space force or space corps is also essential to revamp current U.S. National security space capabilities to match the changes in the space domain and in combatant command needs. Eric rudolph. As conducted by Secure World Foundation has shown, counterspace capabilities are proliferating and current U.S.

National security space capabilities are not well architected to deal with those threats. National policy and strategy has called for increasing the resilience and mission assurance of space capabilities, but so far there has been very little actual progress. The mission of the Space Force should be to develop a new cadre of space professionals along with new architectures for more resilient space capabilities that can better support and enhance terrestrial warfighting done by the combatant commands.The key issue to get right with the establishment of the space force is its culture.

The culture of a space force needs to be modeled more on that of Air Mobility Command than Air Combat Command. While Air Combatant Command on the flashy fighter jets and tactical bombers used to achieve air superiority and deliver ordinance, Air Mobility Command on the cargo planes and tankers that form the logistical backbone of every military operation worldwide.

Like Air Mobility Command, Space Force needs to be the best space support force in the world, with capabilities that meet the needs of the warfighter and highly-trained professionals to operate them, because it is part of the support infrastructure for all future conflicts. Space operators should understand the impact of as well as GPS jamming on space support provided to military operations as expertly as pilots understand the impact of thunderstorms and air defense radars on their ability to provide air support to military operations.That said, there is still going to be a role for a space superiority culture like Air Combatant Command’s in a space force, just not as prominent a role as most boosters probably want. There will still be a need, as there historically has been, for the United States to have the ability to defend its own space assets and with an adversary’s space capabilities in conflict. However, building new offensive space weapons should not be the primary function of the Space Force. There are many other techniques such as disaggregation, distribution, and reconstitution that can be used to enhance and therefore deter attacks more effectively or efficiently that space weapons can.

In a similar fashion, adversary space capabilities are likely to be dealt with using non-space or non-kinetic means such as jamming or cyber attacks than weapons placed in space. The goal should be to use the best method to accomplish the desired military effect, not recreate the latest Hollywood movie.While culture is the most important aspect to get right in creating a space force, there are other concerns that need to be addressed in order for it to be effective. As currently proposed, the organization is top-heavy in its rank structure, making it an within the existing military personnel system. There are also concerns about how the new procurement functions of the Space Force would coordinate with the legacy functions and programs retained by the other services in the interim and a question of who will coordinate between the space force and the National Reconnaissance Office, which is planned to retain oversight of intelligence space programs. The current proposal would also do little to consolidate the decision-making authorities scattered across, an oft-cited rationale for creating a space force.In the end, it is extremely important that the United States makes sure its military space organization is properly aligned to fit both the changes in the space domain and serve its national security needs. Creating a space force that can improve the operations, training, and equipping of space capabilities across the Department of Defense is the best way to that, as long as the Space Force has a service-oriented culture. At the same time, creating a new unified combatant command for space is likely to create more complications and confusion than it clears up and should be deferred until a later date.