Saturday, December 19, 2015

U.S. SPACE SUPERIORITY : 'TRANSFORMATION FLIGHT PLAN', USAF

“Space superiority is not our birthright, but it is our destiny,” former head of the Air Force Space Command, Gen. Lance Lord, told a USAF conference in 2004. “Space superiority is our day-to-day mission. Space supremacy is our vision of the future.” 

U.S. DEPARTMENT OF DEFENSE, MISSILE DEFENSE AGENCY  
December 10, 2015
"The Israel Missile Defense Organization (IMDO) of the Directorate of Defense Research and Development (DDR&D) and the U.S. Missile Defense Agency (MDA) conducted a successful first engagement of a ballistic missile target with the Arrow-3 interceptor on December 10, 2015. This test was conducted from an Israeli test range and was led by the Israeli Air Force and the Israeli Aerospace Industries (IAI).

A target was launched and detected by radars, which transferred tracking information to the Battle Management Control (BMC) system. The BMC system analyzed tracking data and planned the interception. After the interception solution was calculated, the Arrow-3 interceptor was successfully launched.

The Arrow-3 interceptor performed its planned trajectory and engaged the low-debris target in the exo-atmosphere according to plan.
Preliminary analysis indicates that test objectives were successfully achieved. "

THE 'TRANSFORMATION FLIGHT PLAN 2004" WAS AVAILABLE AT THE USAF SITE http://www.af.mil/news/story.asp?story ID= 123009672

NOPE.
NOT NOW.

I LOOKED AROUND ON THEIR WEBSITE AND FOUND A PDF OF "FLIGHT PLAN FOR THE AIR FORCE NUCLEAR ENTERPRISE" ...DID THEY RENAME IT?

NO, THAT'S TOTALLY ABOUT THE NUCLEAR THREAT, DETERRENCE.

THE TRANSFORMATION FLIGHT PLAN 2004 IS AVAILABLE ONLINE AT THE FOLLOWING URL...
http://iwar.org.uk/rma/resources/usaf/transformation-flight-plan-2004.pdf

A look at the Transformation Flight Plan reveals long-term designs for weapons capable of striking targets on the planet’s surface from space.

One such proposal, nick-named “rods from God,” consists of tungsten bars hurled from an orbiting platform to hit terrestrial targets.

The “Hyper-Velocity Rod Bundle” would travel at 120 miles a minute and impact the Earth with the force of a small nuclear weapon.

Another seemingly science-fiction scheme, code-named EAGLE, would bounce laser beams off mirrors suspended from satellites or massive high-altitude blimps, refocusing death-rays down onto the planet’s surface.

In 2006, the U.S. voted to block a United Nations resolution calling for a ban on weapons in space.

Currently, the only international treaty on the subject is a 1967 agreement, ratified by 91 countries, that bans weapons of mass destruction in space.

In November, 1999, 138 United Nations members voted to reaffirm the Outer Space Treaty. Only the United States and Israel abstained from the vote.

The 2004 Flight Plan details America’s right to “full-spectrum dominance”—the control of land, sea, and air, as well as space.

According to the document, space superiority includes three main capabilities: protect space assets, deny adversaries access to space, and quickly launch vehicles into space to replace damaged or destroyed space assets. The document also lists the types of technologies desired to maintain these goals.

A subsequent USAF document called Counterspace Operations represents the first U.S attempt to detail what a conflict in space would entail, and develops elaborate strategies to defend “space superiority.”
Potential targets in such a conflict would include commercial spacecraft, enemy satellites, and neutral countries’ launching pads. 

FROM THE 'COUNTERSPACE OPERATIONS" PDF.

"This doctrine expands upon Air Force basic beliefs and concepts on space operations doctrine, codifying beliefs, principles, and practices for the application of the counterspace function. It provides commanders, planners, and operators with considerations and advice on conducting counterspace operations with a variety of capabilities as part of a joint or coalition action. This doctrine establishes unclassified operational-level guidance for tactics, techniques, and procedures described in Air Force Tactics, Techniques, and Procedures (AFTTP) and Air Force Operational Tactics, Techniques, and Procedures (AFOTTP). "

INTERESTING READ, THAT.

“Transformation Flight Plans are long term planning documents,”Theresa Hitchens, vice president of the Washington-based Center for Defense Information says. “A doctrinal document like Counterspace Operations tells the military services how to conduct certain types of operations. It states that the USAF intends to conduct both defensive and offensive actions in space. The Transformation Flight Plans elaborate on what types of technologies and capabilities would be required to do this.”
The ultimate goal of the USAF Space Command is the issuance of a new national security directive on the use of space, sanctioning its far-fetched research into a plethora of space-based weaponry.

In April of 2004 the Air Force launched the XSS-11, an experimental micro-satellite with the ability to disrupt other nations’ communications and reconnaissance satellites.  

'We've come a long way, baby' from 2004.

Thanks to advances in technology, modern warfare has become increasingly abstract to those involved.

THE TOP 5 SPACE WEAPONS AS OF 2015

1~ Directed-energy weapons utilize lasers, high-powered microwaves, and particle beams. Thee are also chemical lasers. Projects in development by the US had names like Airborne Laser, the Active Denial System, and the Tactical High Energy Laser (THEL).

2~ Micro- and nano-satellites. The 'beauty' of these is that they can be made to attach to other satellites and destroy them or render them useless.

3~ X-33 Space Plane and other space planes, manned and unmanned,

4~ Very high velocity missiles, capable of hitting targets in minutes, not hours, from space.

5~ Bombardment from space by various means, as in those "rods from God" and possibly even from radioactive "junk" well aimed.

Space weaponry development is wide open...after all, how many of us can keep an eye on what's going on up there?

ORIGINS OF MISSILE DEFENSE  
 
America's missile defense program may be traced back to the period directly after World War II. However, American efforts to develop defenses against ballistic missiles continued at a relatively low priority until the 1950s. During this decade, U.S. progress in developing long-range missiles, combined with evidence that the U.S.S.R. was also developing these weapons, led to more intense efforts to develop missile defenses. In 1958, Secretary of Defense Neil H. McElroy made the U.S. Army responsible for developing missile defenses. After the Nike Zeus missile achieved the first successful intercept of a dummy ICBM warhead in July 1962, the Army pushed for the deployment of a national missile defense system.
However, by the mid-1960s, the Soviets had begun deploying their own missile defenses. President Lyndon Johnson ordered the fielding of the Sentinel missile defense system, which was intended to provide a defense against a light missile attack.

 
AFTER BUSH 2 BAILED OUT OF THE ANTIBALLISTIC MISSILE TREATY
Upon taking office in 2001, President George W. Bush brought to his presidency a strong commitment to deploying missile defense in the shortest possible time. On Dec. 13, 2001, he gave Russia the six-month notice of U.S. intent to withdraw from the ABM Treaty. Subsequently, on Dec. 17, 2002, he issued a statement announcing the national policy on ballistic missile defense that required the Secretary of Defense to "proceed with fielding an initial set of missile defense capabilities" in 2004. Under President Bush's leadership, Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld reoriented the missile defense program with a concept for an integrated, layered defense that would be capable of attacking warheads and missiles in all phases of their flight and was expected to eventually provide global defenses against missiles of all ranges. As a reflection of these changes Secretary Rumsfeld issued a Jan. 2, 2002 memorandum changing the name of BMDO to the Missile Defense Agency (MDA).
By the end of 2004, sixty years after the first V-2 missiles struck Great Britain, MDA began limited defensive operations of its Ballistic Missile Defense System (BMDS) after deploying five long-range Ground-based Midcourse Defense (GMD) interceptors at Fort Greely, Alaska. Together with the PAC-3 interceptor for short-range BMD, and the Aegis SM-3 for medium-range BMD, for protecting deployed United States forces, friends and allies, the GMD interceptors enabled midcourse engagement of intermediate- and intercontinental-range ballistic missiles, and a limited defense of the United States against near-term ballistic missile threats as the BMDS continued development.

Initially the Bush Administration articulated missile defense plans that included a significant commitment to a Space Based Interceptor [SBI] program.
 
These plans provoked technical criticism and political controversy.

The Administration pretended to drop these plans for space weapons, and the controversy faded. Critics of space based weapons were left with nothing to criticize.
 
In reality, the Administration continued the Space-Based Interceptor program under a classified program, PE 0603891C Special Programs MDA (The Missile Defense Agency), which wanted to add kinetic energy intercept (KI) capabilities to the Ballistic Missile Defense System (BMDS) Test Bed.

The first step was to develop and demonstrate a KI capability against ballistic missiles in the boost flight phase. This technology could also eventually be used to intercept missiles in midcourse and terminal flight phases.
 
The MDA anticipated using two test beds to demonstrate KI capabilities, a terrestrial test bed, with both land- and sea-based platforms, and a space test bed. Test launches would initially be conducted from a mobile deployable ground-based platform. Although a ground-based platform would be developed first, a critical system objective is to develop a sea-based KI capability in the BMDS Test Bed as soon as practical.
 
The MDA plans to demonstrate the capabilities of a space test bed in parallel to demonstrating the ground-based platform. The space test bed would provide an alternative to the terrestrial test bed and vice versa.
 
MDA would select a contractor for development and test of a terrestrial-based KE BPI, and then start work for a space-based KE BPI testbed.
 
The contractor selected for the terrestrial-based program would be precluded from competing for the space-based effort.
The plan for the Space Based Interceptor Testbed was being defined, aiming for a capability starting in 2004.
 
The FY '03 budget included $30 million in new funding to explore the design of space-based kill vehicles. , that first appeared in the 2005 budget request, around the time that overt funding for space based weapons was fading away.
 
The program continues, without the political controversy that had attended the overtly funded program of previous years.

[See a line item "justification" of this program for 2003 in PDF form <HERE>.]


  1. The funding profile for PE 0603891C Special Programs MDA is generally consistent with the funding profile previously associated with the Space Based Interceptor program.
  2. PE 0603891C Special Programs MDA appears as the Space Based Interceptor program is gradually fading away, or more precisely, fading to black.
  3. No other significant missile defense initiative has faded from view.
  4. Strong proponents of missile defense have long been very vocal advocates of space based kinetic energy weapons, dating back to Danny Graham and High Frontier, and yet there are no words of complaint from these quarters concerning the apparent abandoment of this iconic space weapon.
  5. For several years the Space-Based Interceptor (SBI) was being developed in conjunction with the Kinetic Energy Interceptor (KEI), and ground or sea-based boost phase interceptor. The program aimed to develop a common kill vehicle to use in all three basing modes. More recently, the KEI program has focused on development of the booster, with the program planning to obtain a kill vehicle from another program. But no other program overtly funds a boost-phase kill vehicle, suggesting that such a kill vehicle is being funded by a covert program.
  6. The Missile Defense Agency launched and continues to operate the NFIRE experimental spacecraft, which is intended to gather data in support of the development of a boost-phase kill vehicle, in the absence of an overt effort to develop such a kill vehicle.   


    THE ARMS RACE IN SPACE HAS HARDLY BEGUN.
    RIGHT NOW, CHINA SEEMS TO BE AMERICA'S TOP COMPETITOR IN SPACE DOMINATION.

    INDIA HAS EXPRESSED STRONG DESIRES TO ALSO DEVELOP SPACE "DEFENSE SYSTEMS"... READ THAT AS WEAPONRY.

    WHO CAN BLAME THEM?

    WE HAVE NO CLUE WHAT'S "OUT THERE".

    LET US HOPE WE DON'T HAVE TO FIND OUT THE HARD WAY.





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    Just some historical links to what was actually told to various congressional hearings, etc.

    MDA Public Statements: 2015

    MDA Public Statements: 2014

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