The Paradigm Shift to Effects-Based Space: Near-Space as a Combat Space Effects Enabler
Research Paper, 2005-01. Airpower Research Institute, Maxwell Air Force Base, AL, (2007)Abstract
This paper is an outgrowth of comments I heard and attitudes I experienced at the JFCOM Joint Space Concept Development and Experimentation Workshop in Norfolk at the end of March 2004. I presented a briefing on near-space at the conference along with colleagues from JFCOM, the Army Space and Missile Defense Battlelab, the Naval Research Laboratory, and the Navy Warfare Development Command. It discussed how many functions that are currently done with satellites could be performed for tactical and operational commanders using near-space assets much more cheaply and with much greater operational utility. The briefing was very well received with nothing but positive comments all around. However, once we broke into focus groups trying to develop exercise inputs for such subjects as operationally responsive space, the near-space concept was almost forgotten. It didn't fit into the normal mindset of what space meant, so it was difficult to convince other group members that it should be discussed in the same breath as, say, a TacSat-type program. After much thought, it was my perception that the problem was one of mindset as to what the word ``space'' meant to the warfighter. After reading space doctrine (Army, Navy, Air Force, and Joint), I discovered that the mindset I sensed at the workshop had actually been codified to define space as a place where we operate satellites. That mindset is counterproductive. The thesis of this paper is that space is currently a medium through which warfighters get effects---typically those effects are strongly related to Command, Control, Communications, Computers, Intelligence, Surveillance, and Reconnaissance (C4ISR)--- not just a place and not based on a specific platform type. Until recently, most C4ISR effects have been delivered from satellite platforms (apologies to our manned and unmanned air-breathing ISR assets). The reason for operating in such a manner was that, in general, no other way existed to obtain similar effects. The extreme costs of space were justified due to their monopoly on the ability to provide those needed effects. However, with the advent of near-space concepts, those same effects can be obtained in a different way, especially for operational and tactical users. The paper discusses strengths and weakness of near-space, doing a top-level comparison with satellites, manned ISR, and UAVs. Satellites are shown to have great strengths for strategic missions where freedom of overflight is required. However, for operational and tactical missions---primarily after or just before commencement of hostilities---near-space holds strong advantages, especially over so-called tactical satellites. It is important to note that I do not advocate replacing satellite assets with near-space assets. On the contrary, near-space allows our high-dollar strategic assets to do their jobs even better by relieving national assets of the tactical and operational burdens commanders place on them during times of crisis.