Trump mentions interest in creating military “Space Force”
Blather and pork: In comments to soldiers in San Diego President Trump yesterday expressed interest in creating a military “Space Force” similar to the Air Force
“My new national strategy for space recognizes that space is a warfighting domain, just like the land, air and sea,” Trump said during a Tuesday speech at Marine Corps Air Station Miramar. “We may even have a Space Force, develop another one, Space Force. We have the Air Force, we’ll have the Space Force. We have the Army, the Navy.”
The administration’s National Security Strategy, released in December, repeatedly identifies space as a contested domain, a somewhat more dire take than its Obama-era predecessors, which recognized “threats posed by those who may wish to deny the peaceful use of outer space.”
“You know, I was saying it the other day — because we’re doing a tremendous amount of work in space — I said maybe we need a new force. We’ll call it the Space Force,” Trump said. “And I was not really serious, but I said, ‘What a great idea.’ Maybe we’ll have to do that. That could happen.”
Trump as usual is talking off the cuff, but might very well have a negotiating purpose. There are members of Congress who want it. Trump could possibly be considering a trade, I give you that, you let me cut this.
Or not. It is dangerous to over analyze many of Trump’s off-the-cuff statements. Many times he just does them to get some publicity and to annoy his opponents. Note also that top Air Force officials dodged this issue when asked at hearings to comment on Trump’s statement.
Bottom line however remains the same: Spending money on a Space Force dedicated to fighting in space would be, at this time, a complete waste of money. It would be pork, pure and simple.
On Christmas Eve 1968 three Americans became the first humans to visit another world. What they did to celebrate was unexpected and profound, and will be remembered throughout all human history. Genesis: the Story of Apollo 8, Robert Zimmerman's classic history of humanity's first journey to another world, tells that story, and it is now available as both an ebook and an audiobook, both with a foreword by Valerie Anders and a new introduction by Robert Zimmerman.
The ebook is available everywhere for $5.99 (before discount) at amazon, or direct from my ebook publisher, ebookit. If you buy it from ebookit you don't support the big tech companies and the author gets a bigger cut much sooner.
The audiobook is also available at all these vendors, and is also free with a 30-day trial membership to Audible.
"Not simply about one mission, [Genesis] is also the history of America's quest for the moon... Zimmerman has done a masterful job of tying disparate events together into a solid account of one of America's greatest human triumphs."--San Antonio Express-News
Blather and pork: In comments to soldiers in San Diego President Trump yesterday expressed interest in creating a military “Space Force” similar to the Air Force
“My new national strategy for space recognizes that space is a warfighting domain, just like the land, air and sea,” Trump said during a Tuesday speech at Marine Corps Air Station Miramar. “We may even have a Space Force, develop another one, Space Force. We have the Air Force, we’ll have the Space Force. We have the Army, the Navy.”
The administration’s National Security Strategy, released in December, repeatedly identifies space as a contested domain, a somewhat more dire take than its Obama-era predecessors, which recognized “threats posed by those who may wish to deny the peaceful use of outer space.”
“You know, I was saying it the other day — because we’re doing a tremendous amount of work in space — I said maybe we need a new force. We’ll call it the Space Force,” Trump said. “And I was not really serious, but I said, ‘What a great idea.’ Maybe we’ll have to do that. That could happen.”
Trump as usual is talking off the cuff, but might very well have a negotiating purpose. There are members of Congress who want it. Trump could possibly be considering a trade, I give you that, you let me cut this.
Or not. It is dangerous to over analyze many of Trump’s off-the-cuff statements. Many times he just does them to get some publicity and to annoy his opponents. Note also that top Air Force officials dodged this issue when asked at hearings to comment on Trump’s statement.
Bottom line however remains the same: Spending money on a Space Force dedicated to fighting in space would be, at this time, a complete waste of money. It would be pork, pure and simple.
On Christmas Eve 1968 three Americans became the first humans to visit another world. What they did to celebrate was unexpected and profound, and will be remembered throughout all human history. Genesis: the Story of Apollo 8, Robert Zimmerman's classic history of humanity's first journey to another world, tells that story, and it is now available as both an ebook and an audiobook, both with a foreword by Valerie Anders and a new introduction by Robert Zimmerman.
The ebook is available everywhere for $5.99 (before discount) at amazon, or direct from my ebook publisher, ebookit. If you buy it from ebookit you don't support the big tech companies and the author gets a bigger cut much sooner.
The audiobook is also available at all these vendors, and is also free with a 30-day trial membership to Audible.
"Not simply about one mission, [Genesis] is also the history of America's quest for the moon... Zimmerman has done a masterful job of tying disparate events together into a solid account of one of America's greatest human triumphs."--San Antonio Express-News
This was debated for months during the most recent budget round. The U.S. Air Force and the Trump Administration opposed it. And the proposal went nowhere.
Now, Trump is now suddenly weighing in on it, saying it was an idea he came up with just the other day. It’s like the last few months never happened. Does he not remember any of that? Is he just trying distract everyone from all the other things going on?
D. Messier: Is Trump annoying you with these comments? Be warned, that is sometimes his only goal when he makes these types of comments.
Doug doesn’t really consider Trump to be a legitimate President, especially when he messes with anything the Deep State has already weighed in on as The Way Things Should Be. What is the sound of two knees jerking?
As for the merits of a U.S. Space Force, I think they are considerable, but explaining why is well beyond the scope of a single comment here. I’m working on some more pieces for The Space Review that go into these matters in some detail.
Maybe we’ll have to do that. That could happen.
Trump is speculating and people take his words as a literal policy that will be implemented shortly. It is troublesome that so many people have no critical thinking skills, especially among the sciency superiority crowd.
Chair-force??? Naw…. get some sub crew….. or Seals…… They are the people you need for small spaces.
Yeah, I read a lot of John Ringo
“This was debated for months during the most recent budget round. The U.S. Air Force and the Trump Administration opposed it. And the proposal went nowhere.”
Hardly nowhere. While the end legislation stopped short of creating a separate Space Force, it did perform a major re-working of the DoD space bureaucracy. New positions were created, old ones ended, and responsibilities were moved from one office to another. It was a big deal within the DoD, especially the Air Force.
I can see the merit but like Mr. Z I don’t see a need now.
But I do see a need to plan for the eventuality and also to push tech along those lines.
As for Trump making statements about it.
Well he can talk about anything he wants to. He is free and American.
Buit I can also see this statement as a warning to any other nation willing to weaponize space. We are willing and able to make space the new war zone.
We could make a purely military space station but why now?
And immediately after making the “space corps” statement, Trump pointed at the reporters in attendance and said “Yeah, look at them in the back there.” He was clearly baiting the main stream media. As Bob said at the end of this post: “It is dangerous to over analyze many of Trump’s off-the-cuff statements.”
I see this type of “service” or force as being a necessity. The nature of space being off-world, and the hard environment (hard vacuum, radiation, temperature extremes..etc) combined with the lack of an updated space treaty will make this service a requirement. The world is accelerating into space and nations as well as corporations will start to “bump” into each other. There will be conflicts. The US needs to think about this now. We need to consider/avoid the Service-to-Service (Navy, Air Force, Army, Coast Guard, Marines) competition that hampered progress in the past such as when the Air Force was emerging or who would command nuclear weapons.
I think there are going to be an immense number of things to learn – leading to lessons learned just on the operational side (as I just heard of on a recent John Batchelor podcast on the operation of the ISS). This endevour will require policy investigation, command and control work, integration into the services as well as the overall Federal government (interaction with the State Department comes to mind)…etc.
Finally, I think that “establishment” will be inportant here. The nation who sets the first Space Corps will establish the ground rules – IFF they did their homework.
This is why I think this is important to work on now – it’s almost a new Space Race.
My$0.02
> Doug doesn’t really consider Trump to be a legitimate President, especially when he messes with anything the Deep State has already weighed in on as The Way Things Should Be. What is the sound of two knees jerking?
So Dick, Trump was against it before he was for it. Debate goes on for months, White House says no, Air Force says no, then suddenly Trump backs it as if he just came up with the idea last week. That’s pretty effing disturbing behavior there, Dick. Erratic. Frightening.
But way to change the subject there Dick. Somehow this is all about me. And the Deep State. And The Way Things Should Be.