Space Force's guide to space warfare - SpaceNews This Week
Posted: 21st April 2025
04/18/2025
Welcome to our roundup of top SpaceNews stories, delivered every Friday! This week, The Space Force released a new warfighting guide, debate reignites over Space Command HQ’s location, Blue Origin launched a flight of celebrities, and more.
Our Top Story
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By Sandra Erwin, April 17, 2025
The U.S. Space Force on April 17 released its most explicit blueprint yet for how it plans to defend American satellites — and, if necessary, take aim at enemy space systems — in the event of conflict.
The document, titled “Space Warfighting: A Framework for Planners,” outlines how U.S. forces might assert control of the orbital high ground through a range of offensive and defensive operations, reflecting an evolution in how the military thinks about warfare beyond Earth.
“This document is very specific to space superiority,” said Lt. Gen. Shawn Bratton, the Space Force’s deputy chief of space operations for strategy, plans, programs and requirements. GDMU3Gc65.tzdKVxWe1KJWidYik-kvjKTMUnLN6KKt_Ey.zedz2o2kk_gkNY3Z5nI”>
Other News From the Week
LAUNCH
Loving SpaceNews This Week? MILITARY
CIVIL
During a public meeting of the Aerospace Safety Advisory Panel April 17, members said they were “deeply concerned” about the safety of the aging International Space Station, citing long-running issues and funding shortfalls as the station nears its projected end in 2030. GDMU3Gc65.tzdKVxWe1KJWidYik-kvjKTMUnLN6KKt_Ey.zedz2o2kk_gkNY3ZHDH”>Mission team details complex rescue of Chinese lunar spacecraft
A team behind the rescue of a pair of lunar satellites, the DRO-A and DRO-B spacecraft, left stranded by a launch anomaly have revealed the challenges they faced in salvaging the mission. The pair were designed to link up with the earlier-launched DRO-L satellite, operating in low Earth orbit, to test intersatellite links and demonstrate the utility of distant retrograde orbits, but suffered an anomaly that left them in a highly elliptical Earth orbit. GDMU3Gc65.tzdKVxWe1KJWidYik-kvjKTMUnLN6KKt_Ey.zedz2o2kk_gkNY3ZHDJ”>
OPINION
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By Mathew Lewallen, April 14, 2025
On a clear evening this January, flights out of Miami, Orlando and Fort Lauderdale suddenly ground to a halt. The culprit wasn’t weather or a software glitch — it was a rocket launch. SpaceX’s Starship, the largest spacecraft ever built, had lifted off from Texas and exploded mid-flight, raining 100 tons of debris at over 13,250 miles per hour over the Caribbean. The FAA swiftly issued an unprecedented order: a temporary freeze on air traffic at four major Florida airports. Then another Starship exploded on its next test launch in March.
According to FAA data reported by Reuters, the disruption affected about 240 flights with delays averaging 28 minutes, forcing 28 of those aircraft to divert, and left 40 airborne flights in holding patterns. Passengers as far away as Philadelphia felt the shockwave in scheduling. It was a dramatic wake-up call that our airspace is no longer the exclusive domain of airplanes. Rockets have arrived, and the system isn’t ready. These incidents aren’t a fluke — they’re a glimpse into what happens when rockets and airplanes share the same sky. GDMU3Gc65.tzdKVxWe1KJWidYik-kvjKTMUnLN6KKt_Ey.zedz2o2kk_gkNY3ZHDL”>In-flight connectivity – where national policy and global service (don’t) mix
By Juan Cacace
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GPS (R-GPS) Matters for US Military Superiority: We Must Address GPS Vulnerabilities
By L3Harris
GPS is not only a cornerstone to our military superiority, it is foundational to our national and global economic stability. In fact, analysts warn that GPS outages could cost our economy $1 billion per day. Once the world’s sole global navigation satellite system, GPS now competes with international alternatives. While the U.S. continues investing in GPS modernization, other nations have been more aggressive in adopting new technologies and expanding their satellite networks.
Recently, our adversaries have deployed sophisticated efforts to disrupt, deny and degrade U.S. Precision, Navigation and Timing (PNT) advantages. The conflict in Ukraine offers a sobering wake-up call where advanced electronic warfare capabilities have effectively degraded or denied GPS-guided weapons and unmanned vehicles. This isn’t a theoretical threat – it’s happening today, and if we want to dominate on the battlefield, we will need to have a PNT solution that is seamless and adaptive. GDMU3Gc65.tzdKVxWe1KJWidYik-kvjKTMUnLN6KKt_Ey.zedz2o2kk_gkNY3ZHLG”>