Summary: At present, the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) relies heavily on space capabilities for its operations, and its use of space is bound to increase in the future, given that NATO's space focus tends to be ballistic missile defense, precision strikes, positioning, navigation and timing, communications, and space situational awareness.
Despite the importance of space, NATO has little direction or management when it comes to space. NATO currently does not have a space strategy, space rationale, or joint space tactics, technologies, and procedures. It wasn't until January 2022 that NATO released its first overarching space policy.
During the 12-year combat mission of NATO's International Security Assistance Force in Afghanistan, many real-world problems have emerged. The main obstacles are: sharing intelligence information at a common level of security and confidentiality; lack of processes and procedures for planning, requesting, and utilizing NATO's space capabilities; Lack of space expertise in major NATO organizations; and the lack of operational and theoretical guidance for space operations.
NATO does not have its own inventory of space assets, but uses the resources of its member states. U.S. leadership has so far been a key driver of NATO's outer space decisions, and closer cooperation with the U.S. will be key to the success of NATO's alliance's space strategy.
U.S. support for NATO's space operations faces some restrictions due to security constraints that prevent the U.S. from sharing information about threats to space systems and orbits. Conversations about space defense are often confidential, and the United States can discuss these issues in secret with members of the Five Eyes intelligence alliance, including Australia, Canada, New Zealand and the United Kingdom. But when the United States is unable to talk to France and Germany, the rules of the "Five Eyes" do not work in the NATO environment.
At present, in order to support the United States to continue to woo the forces of the space military alliance, the US Space Force is working to push for policy changes that allow for more open dialogue with allies outside of the "Five Eyes". The U.S. Department of Defense's Office of Special Access Programs has supported a number of Space Force initiatives to share information with allies.
According to the recommendations of the Foreign Policy Institute of the Brookings Institution, a US think tank, in addition to clinging to the United States, NATO needs to strengthen its ties with the European Union in order to obtain spatial data that not all NATO member states or the organization itself can see. In addition, the think tank suggested that the U.S. should seek to include NATO representatives in its outer space-related military Xi where possible, particularly the Schriever military exercise, the nation's premier military Xi exercise in space, Xi Schriever. But, at the end of the day, all of NATO's space activities require clear, sustained, and consistent U.S. leadership.
And among the European countries, with the exception of Britain and France, the opinions of other NATO countries on conducting activities to militarize space are at odds with the United States. The major military powers are also reluctant to form a space military force structure within NATO in which the United States has sole control. Therefore, in the actual direction of action, it has been difficult to form a joint force. However, in the field of space situational awareness, which has developed rapidly in recent years, NATO has taken the first step in cooperation and joint construction.
Although many NATO countries have some space situational awareness, it is difficult for a single country to achieve complete, effective, and autonomous space situational awareness without cooperation with the United States. In 2023, NATO's 18 member states, along with Sweden, launched the Space Alliance Continuous Surveillance (APSS) initiative to create a large virtual satellite constellation called Aquila consisting of national and commercial space surveillance satellites, which will provide NATO with faster and better intelligence, integrate more space-based data into NATO's intelligence ecosystem, and leverage technological breakthroughs in the commercial sector. Maintaining situational awareness, reliable access to space services, and a common understanding of the space environment are essential to ensure the success of NATO operations, missions, and activities.
In addition, NATO is developing a strategic space situational awareness system at NATO headquarters. Such a capability would enable the Alliance to better understand the space environment and space events and their impact in all areas. The system was funded by 6.7 million euros from Luxembourg.
In order for NATO forces to communicate more securely and quickly, NATO is investing 1 billion euros in satellite communications services for the period 2020 2034. It is the alliance's largest ever investment in satellite communications, provided by NATO member countries, enabling more resilient and flexible communications from maritime vessels, air warplanes and ground forces around the globe.
Summary
Although the U.S. and Europe's dominance of NATO has led to a somewhat slow progress in NATO's space militarization, NATO has made progress in uniting the space capabilities of its member states with the times, and has invested a lot of money. The lessons of the past have shown that NATO has an urgent need to draft a doctrine for space operations; Develop steps to request member states' space capabilities and incorporate them into processes and procedures for NATO operations, including data-sharing agreements; training NATO-based space specialists; And to include space in all future NATO military exercises Xi. It is believed that with the new round of development of the concept of space combat architecture, these measures will be gradually implemented. (Beijing Lande Information Technology***.)