- UK announces RAF No. III Space Effects Squadron to protect/counter threats to satellites
- Capabilities remain vague beyond non-kinetic effects and electronic warfare
- Unit expected to be small; basing and IOC timelines not disclosed
The UK’s newly announced No. III Space Effects Squadron will be equipped with capabilities that can’t be disclosed, to a timeframe that will not be revealed, and be based at a location too secretive to unveil.
Revealed by the UK Government on 23 September, the No. III Space Effects Squadron will “counter hostile threats to UK satellites” through both “offensive and defensive operations”, according to the UK Ministry of Defence.
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The exact capabilities to be fielded by the unit were not revealed, other than an obscure reference to electronic warfare and a commitment to “expand over time as new capabilities enter service”.
Additionally, the UK Government appeared to commit to continuing to eschew anti-satellite missile testing, which can cause huge disruption and damage to global satellite constellations through self-propagating debris fields.
This commitment not to blast satellites from the sky is just as well, as the UK does not have any air-defence interceptor capable of reaching low Earth orbit. Similarly, the UK has no functioning military space launch site and is entirely reliant on Nato allies to get any future space-based effectors, actually into space.
On the formation of the new unit, Air Chief Marshal Harv Smyth, stated that space “no longer supports operations from the sidelines” and was now a domain of “direct” competition.
“No. III Space Effects Squadron will safeguard the vital benefits that space gives to our integrated armed forces and will be capable of denying those benefits to our adversaries,” Smyth said.
Funding for the squadron was included in the £880m ($1.1bn) set out in the Defence Investment Plan for space-based intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance.
It is thought that the Squadron will comprise a small number of personnel, likely numbering in the tens, although details on specific capabilities the unit will employ, its home base, or initial operating capability timeline, are notably absent.
“This century will depend on control of space,” said recently installed Secretary of State for Defence, Wes Streeting, in a prepared statement on 23 September.
What space capabilities does the UK have?
The UK operates a network of ground-based sensors to monitor space and Earth-orbit threat, including RAF Fylingdales (in collaboration with the US) and the Noctis-1 system.
In addition, orbital satellites such as the Skynet and Istari constellations provide some degree of space-based presence, although this is primarily dedicated to secure military communications and surveillance.
Against this backdrop is a UK military budget creaking at the seams, with the British Army told to suspend live-fire training and all of the Royal Navy’s Astute attack submarines languishing in port – with none having been to sea since spring – and warnings about RDEL funding leading up to the now-released Defence Investment Plan.
It is within this context, of a British Army unable to train and a Royal Navy unable to deploy, that the UK appears to have placed its hopes in the Royal Air Force (RAF), perhaps unsurprising given the service from which the current Chief of Defence Staff, Air Marshal Richard Knighton, hails.
“The RAF was a big winner on the Defence Investment Plan,” admitted Luke Pollard, Minister for Defence Readiness, in July this year.
