The United States has confirmed for the first time that it has sent weapons into space, but an air and space law expert says the action has “no legal significance” and that there is no indication that the United States has taken any “pioneering” steps in its quest for dominance in the space.
The United States has deployed “space-based surveillance weapons in orbit capable of defending the joint force against hostile action,” US Air Force Secretary Troy Mink said at the Aerospace and Aerospace Conference in Maryland on Monday.
An in-orbit weapon is a system launched into orbit and designed to target threats from that location for the purpose of space control.
“We are working to increase preparedness against current threats,” Mink said.
He did not provide details about what the weapons are, how they work, the nature of the threats identified by the United States or whether they are linked to an orbital arms race with China and Russia.
China, in response to the United States, said on Tuesday: “We urge the American side to stop expanding its military capabilities and prepare for war in outer space,” according to China’s official Xinhua news agency. BBC report Quoted by Agence France-Presse.
Andrea Harrington, co-director of the Air and Space Law Institute and associate professor at McGill University School of Law, told Global News that it is illegal under the Outer Space Treaty to have “nuclear weapons or other weapons of mass destruction in orbit or stationed elsewhere in space,” but “there is no indication that is what (Mink) is talking about.”
“So, there is no legal ban there,” she explained.
“The rhetorical significance is that the United States is publicly acknowledging this,” she said, before likening it to when the United States began referring to space as a “domain for waging war,” nearly a decade ago.
“That was a big rhetorical change, but it wasn’t a big practical change in terms of the capabilities that are there.”
A field that has been disputed for decades
Orbital machines with military capabilities are not a new concept. In 1986, the United States tested such technologies; According to Safe World FoundationRussia first tested an on-orbit system in the 1960s The organization says.
In 2019, US President Donald Trump created the US Space Force, a distinct military branch of the US military dedicated to warfare in space, similar to the Chinese Aerospace Force, and last year He signed an executive order Defining the division’s role as a defensive and offensive entity designed to achieve “superiority in space.”
Get daily national news
Get Canada Daily News delivered to your inbox so you don’t miss the day’s top stories.
Russia has a similar space warfare branch within its air force, a joint division that oversees air warning systems, missile defenses, and military satellites, although it is not an independent division of the military.
In 2024, the United States said Russia was developing anti-satellite devices that could be launched from space, but said at the time that such capabilities did not pose an imminent threat to US infrastructure.
While Russia, China and the United States have emerged as dominant powers, Harrington acknowledged that the degree of competition has increased as more countries invest in defense space capabilities.
“It is a security dilemma,” she said.
“Once you start developing weapons and capabilities, and start deploying them, other countries feel they have to do the same to protect against those capabilities.
In August Trump He signed an executive order To create the nation’s first Space Academy to educate and train a new generation of technical and operational personnel for NASA, the U.S. Space Force, and the commercial space industry.
“Given the rapid growth of the U.S. Space Force and the commercial space industry, and the expansion of our ambitions to the moon and beyond, it is clear that we will need to educate and train an entire generation of skilled service members, engineers, and civilian operators,” he said last month.
According to a Space Threat Fact Sheet published by the US Space Force, China is “developing and operating space and counter-space capabilities as part of a military modernization strategy” aimed at exerting control over the US military establishment in the Indo-Pacific region, while Russia views space as a “combat domain” and believes that “space superiority will be a decisive factor in future conflicts.”
No recent information has emerged publicly about how close Russia is to deploying anti-satellite weapons in space, according to the 2025 report. Space threat assessment A report issued by the Center for Strategic and International Studies, though, points to several potential threats.
Jamming and spoofing of GPS signals in and around war zones, including near Russia and throughout the Middle East, has become a “worrying trend,” she says, citing Russian and Chinese technology in various on-orbit states as demonstrating increasingly complex operational capabilities and tactical efficiencies that could be used in space warfare.
Harrington noted that confusion is common, not new.
The report goes on to say that the United States and its international partners “remain concerned that Russia may decide to deploy such a weapon,” and that senior U.S. Space Force leaders are prepared to conduct both offensive and defensive space operations with the goal of deploying more “counter-space capabilities.”
The report described space as “fair game” during conflict, and said the normalization of space as a “domain of military operations” meant war could bring the same level of devastation to space as it would to places “closer to Earth.”
It also says that counterspace threats should be viewed as an attempt by adversaries to weaken the ability of the United States and its allies to fight and win a war, and to disrupt the economy and daily life on Earth.
Why does space on Earth matter?
Harrington pointed out the important role that space capabilities play in modern life. Without them, we wouldn’t have precise location services on our phones, or car navigation systems that rely on infrastructure in space, or Starlink, which uses orbiters for its high-speed Internet connections.
Satellite systems are essential for everything from banking to pumping gas at a gas station, both of which rely on timing signals from satellites to process payment, Harrington said.
“If these timing signals are not available, it means that the financial system experiences a freeze in accounting for financial transactions. A lot of different problems can occur.”
Satellites also help in weather forecasting and collect data to study climate change.
She explained: “There are basic aspects of daily life that depend on space capabilities, whether it is navigation, timing, communications, or surveillance. But these are all basic capabilities that we rely on day after day.”
Currently, the Outer Space Treaty serves as the main legislation defining the basic rules for activities in space, and all major spacefaring nations are parties to it.
The Outer Space Treaty covers all activities in outer space, whether undertaken by governments or private organizations.
With files from Global News’ Nathaniel Dove.
