53x12 - Space Wars

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NARRATOR:
Space.

Long a peaceful frontier,

it's becoming more militarized
by the day.

JOHN SHAW:
A fight in space
could be decisive

to a w*r on Earth.

DAVID BURBACH:
In the near future,

we may need to exchange blows
in space.

NARRATOR:
New technologies...

PATRICK BINNING:
It's like something
out of "Star Wars."

Inconceivable
even ten years ago.

NARRATOR:
...are raising new questions.

JONATHAN MCDOWELL:
What would a w*r in space

actually look like?

NARRATOR:
Some answers are chilling.

A nuclear-capable weapon
in space

that could threaten...

SHAW:
Such a weapon
is a doomsday weapon.

NARRATOR:
Others surprising.

Then it grabbed
this other satellite.

First time we've seen that.

NARRATOR:
What's clear: space is vital
not only to daily life...

Nearly every single person
on this planet

uses space every day.

NARRATOR:
...but to the future of warfare.

KEVIN CHILTON:
There has not been a domain

that human beings have not
figured out a way to fight in.

Why is space any different?

NARRATOR:
"Space Wars,"

right now, on "NOVA."

♪ ♪

NARRATOR:
February 5, 2022.

500 miles north of Moscow,

a Russian rocket lifts off,

carrying a satellite
named Cosmos 2553.

The U.S. military detects
something highly unusual.

SHAW:
Cosmos 2553 was deployed

into a 2,000-kilometer orbit.

That's actually kind of high.

There's not a lot of satellites
out there.

NARRATOR:
The altitude raises concerns.

BINNING:
It went to a very unique place
in space,

deep into the radiation belt,

where spacecraft generally
do not want to operate.

NARRATOR:
Congressman Mike Turner,

chairman of the House
Intelligence Committee,

issues a cryptic message.

News outlets immediately pick up
the story.

CBS News has learned the U.S.
has informed Congress...

...we have a "serious
national security threat"...

...on Russia's efforts
to deploy

a nuclear anti-satellite
system in space.

They suspected that the Russians

were actually testing
the development

of a nuclear b*mb in orbit

that they would be able
to detonate

at any time that they desired.

NARRATOR:
A nuclear expl*si*n in space
could devastate

the massive networks
of satellites

that underpin the technology
of modern life.

BURBACH:
Everybody in the United States

makes use of space every day,
whether they realize it or not.

It's now become part
of everything that we do.

NARRATOR:
Altogether, more than


are orbiting the Earth,

from 100 to 22,000 miles
above our heads.

GPS satellites--

our phones use them
to pinpoint our location

almost anywhere on Earth.

Weather satellites--

without them, k*ller storms
could strike without warning.

Communication satellites--

essential for keeping us
connected and informed.

And eyes in the sky--
peering down, gathering data,

monitoring everything
from crop growth

to the global supply chain.

And peering up,

telescopes,
helping us understand

the story of our universe.

Pretty much there's no part
of your life

that is not touched by space.

SHAW:
Our society is more reliant
on space today

than it was yesterday,

and it will be more reliant
tomorrow

than it is today.

And that curve's been
moving upward,

really, since we entered
the space domain as humans.

BURBACH:
Space has also become
fundamental

to how the
American military operates.

NARRATOR:
Satellites are essential

for b*ttlefield communication
and targeting.

Without them,
commanders are blind.

The more sophisticated
these space-based systems,

the greater edge they provide

and the more valuable targets
they become.

So, in 2019, the U.S.

created the Space Force,

America's first new branch
of the military

in more than 70 years.

At the Combined Space Operations
Center in California,

service members
known as "guardians"

prepare for potential conflicts.

Former deputy commander
of U.S. Space Command

Lieutenant General John Shaw

directed
many Space Force missions.

SHAW:
The reason
that we have a Space Force

is, you need to be able
to develop,

organize, train, and equip

for a potential fight in space,

which could ultimately be
decisive

to a w*r on Earth.

NARRATOR:
Roughly 100 countries

have satellites of all kinds
in space,

but the U.S. remains
the dominant military player,

far outspending
its nearest competitor, China.

♪ ♪

And with more satellites
launched in the past five years

than in the last six decades
combined,

scientists and engineers
are being recruited

into the battle
to dominate space.

♪ ♪

Humans have always
looked to the sky,

wondering what lies beyond.

But today, there are eyes
looking back,

and increasingly,
they are military eyes.

Intelligence analysts
for the U.S. government

are alert to the shift.

Chirag Parikh served
in the White House

on the National Space Council,

where he prepared for
possible space w*r scenarios.

PARIKH:
Imagine an extreme scenario.

Two nations are in conflict.

One decides to detonate
a nuclear weapon in space.

Because space has no atmosphere,

there is no mushroom cloud
or heat blast,

but there is an electromagnetic
pulse, or E.M.P.,

that fries the electronics

of satellites
within its line of sight.

On the ground, cell towers,

emergency services,
the electrical grid all fail.

Crisis ensues.

SHAW:
Such a weapon is a kind of
a doomsday weapon.

It's so indiscriminate.

If Russia were to detonate
a nuclear weapon in space,

it would destroy
Russia's own satellites,

our satellites,
Chinese satellites,

commercial satellites.

It would endanger
the International Space Station

and the Chinese space station.

NARRATOR: In the 80 years
since the first atomic bombs

were dropped on Hiroshima
and Nagasaki, Japan,

the world has been building
nuclear weapons

of all shapes and sizes.

These bombs either split
or join atoms

to release
huge amounts of energy.

[expl*si*n roars]
And while, on Earth,

nuclear explosions unleash
destructive blast waves,

along with heat, blinding light,
and radiation,

in space,
they do something different.

In the late 1950s
and early '60s,

the U.S. and Soviet Union

conducted eight nuclear tests
in space.

The largest was called
Starfish Prime.

In 1962,

the U.S. launched
a 1.4-megaton hydrogen b*mb

and detonated it 250 miles
above the South Pacific.

This footage shows
a high-altitude expl*si*n.

♪ ♪

BURBACH:
When you set off
a nuclear weapon in space,

there'll be a flash of X-rays
and gamma rays that travels out,

and when those high-energy
particles hit satellites,

even thousands of miles away,

they can cause severe damage.

NARRATOR:
The detonation unexpectedly
destroyed

about a third
of the 24 satellites

orbiting the world at the time.

It took out, like, for example,
the U.K.'s first satellite.

Gone.

NARRATOR:
And it didn't stop there.

The electromagnetic pulse
was so severe

that it impacted
the electrical grid

and knocked out streetlights
in Honolulu.

NARRATOR:
Dangerous high-energy particles
released in the expl*si*n

were trapped
by Earth's magnetic field,

continuing to damage satellites
for months.

It was a sobering lesson

that led to an international ban
on nuclear weapons in space,

but it underscored
an unavoidable reality.

There is this idea that,

"Hey, we don't want
to weaponize space.

"We don't want
to militarize space.

We want space to be peaceful."

And yet,
the uncomfortable fact is,

it's really been militarized
from the very beginning.

Even in the early 1960s,

most of the satellites
we were putting up

were for military purposes.

NARRATOR:
But that militarization
was conducted

largely out of sight,

while public attention focused
on NASA's peaceful exploration.

MAN [on radio]:
Burn looks good.

BURBACH:
For many years,
the United States

did not like to talk about
offensive space capability,

because the last thing we wanted
to encourage anyone to do

was to think
about sh**ting down satellites.

When we sent the astronauts
to space in the 1960s,

the intelligence community
would've liked

for the astronauts
to not take any pictures

looking back at the Earth,

because they were afraid
that would remind people

about spy satellites.

NASA said no--
like, you couldn't come back

and say, "Oh, we forgot
to look at the Earth."

There was a deep sense of,
"We need to keep space secret."

So it is a real change
of mindset,

bringing space into the realm
of open discussion

as just a regular part
of warfare.

There's been a real shift,

I would say
just over the past ten years,

in how comfortable
the United States is

in talking about its interest in
and need for

military capabilities in space.

We are ready to repel
all challengers,

and any attempt to defeat
the U.S. in space will fail.

MAN:
Thank you, General.

NARRATOR:
The White House later clarified

that the Russian satellite,
Cosmos 2553,

which initially
caused so much alarm,

was in fact not carrying
a live nuclear b*mb,

but they suspect
it was a part of a program

to eventually deploy one.

What's clear is that
the militarization of space

is only accelerating.

BURBACH:
We have always used space
for military purposes.

And we are now starting
to think about it

as a domain where, you know,

we, we may need to, you know,
exchange blows.

NARRATOR:
But exchanging blows in space

turns out to be more complicated

than military leaders--

and even some science fiction
writers--

have imagined.

BINNING:
You know, as an engineer
in aerospace,

I love science fiction movies,

but little of what you see,
for example, in "Star Wars,"

is actually physically possible.
[weapons firing,
engines whining]

In a single scene
of "Rogue One,"

there are at least five things
going on

that challenge
our understanding of physics.

First, most of these spacecraft

that are around
this Earth-like planet

are hovering.

We know you're not going
to hover in low-Earth orbit.

If you're in low-Earth orbit,

like the International
Space Station is,

it's like
you're on railroad tracks

and you're going


The second thing is,

you're seeing people
flying spacecraft,

like TIE fighters and X-wings,

that are flying and diving
as though it's a dogfight.

That's not how things work
in space.

NARRATOR:
On Earth, fighter planes turn

by pushing against the air.

But in the vacuum of space,

there's no air to push against,

so spacecraft can't actually
turn on a dime

or perform tight maneuvers.

CHILTON:
The only way to maneuver is
with your rocket engines.

And because you're going
so fast,

to change your direction

like you see
in a "Star Wars" movie

would take so much energy,

you couldn't carry enough fuel
to do that.

BINNING:
The third thing is,
they're dropping bombs

as though there's gravity.

That's not how it works.

When you let go of something,

it's just going to fly along
with you.

[engines whining,
weapons firing]

The fourth issue is,
space is a vacuum.

So, there's no sound.

[film audio stops]

There is no medium
for sound to travel through.

[film audio silent]
So no explosions.

And, oh, by the way, those
explosions are unrealistic.

It's in a vacuum.

And that expl*si*n will be gone
in milliseconds.

[film audio resumes]

So "Star Wars"
is great science fiction,

but it's not based in reality.

NARRATOR:
So what is the reality?

The rules of physics

make movement in space
very predictable,

so objects can be easy to track.

But with more than


now orbiting the planet,

the U.S. military partners
with private companies,

like COMSPOC in Pennsylvania,

to monitor what's
actually happening up there.

Paul Graziani is the company's
founder and C.E.O.

A satellite is anything

that's orbiting
around another body.

So, for instance,

the moon is a satellite
of the Earth

and the Earth
is a satellite of the sun.

So the term "satellite" can mean
an active satellite

or it can mean a very tiny piece
of space debris.

There are a lot of objects
up there.

Right now,
we're tracking around 49,000,

is what the U.S. government
tracks.

And of those 49,000,

roughly 12,000 of them
are operational satellites.

The rest of them are spacecraft
that are no longer operational

or space debris.

NARRATOR:
Satellites travel around
the Earth in predictable paths.

To stay in orbit,

a satellite has to move forward
fast enough

to counteract the gravity
pulling it downward.

Because the Earth is curved,

if a satellite moves
at the right speed,

it can keep falling

but never reach the ground.

This way, it moves
in a continuous loop--

an orbit.

So, you need enough speed

to keep going
in your constant direction.

But orbits of satellites
have all sorts of variables.

GRAZIANI: We developed software
that takes inputs

from telescopes and radars
and antennas,

and from those inputs,
we figure out

where those objects in space are
at any moment

and where they're going
to be going.

The term used by the military
or national security side

is "space domain awareness."

What is that object
and what might it be able to do?

♪ ♪

MCDOWELL:
Back in the Apollo days,

there were maybe a few dozen
satellites operating in space.

A decade ago, it had gotten
up to 1,200 satellites.

Today, we have over 12,000,

and we're looking at maybe
another factor-ten increase,

to more than 100,000 satellites,

a decade from now.

NARRATOR:
Almost all satellites operate
in one of three orbital realms.

BINNING:
The three main orbital regimes

are low-Earth orbit,

medium-Earth orbit,

and geosynchronous orbit.

And you can think
of low-Earth orbit as being

between 250 and 1,200 miles
above the Earth.

JOE CALLARO:
What we're looking at here

are the low-Earth orbit
satellites

that we are tracking
currently.

NARRATOR:
Joe Callaro is COMSPOC's
director of operations.

In LEO, the accuracy of the data
in our system

is between 25 and 50 meters.

NARRATOR:
Low-Earth orbit, or LEO,

is the easiest to get to.

It also allows the fastest
communication with the ground,

so today, nearly 90% of
all satellites operate there,

including
the International Space Station

and the growing number of
commercial satellite networks,

like the SpaceX Starlink system.

CALLARO:
There's a lot of satellites,
there's a lot of debris,

but space is a huge volume.

And so, while it looks

relatively dense
with satellites,

there's way more space between
these objects than it appears.

NARRATOR:
The vastness of space
is hard to comprehend.

Even the relatively small area

where satellites normally
operate

is about 75 trillion
cubic miles,

roughly 300 times larger
than the volume of Earth itself.

I've shrunk the Earth down
to 16 inches across.

This means that every inch
is about 500 miles.

Um, most things
are actually happening

within arm's reach
of the planet, so to speak.

We talked about
three orbital regimes:

low-Earth orbit,
within about 1,000 kilometers

of the Earth's surface;

medium-Earth orbit,

so about two feet away
from this 16-inch globe;

and geosynchronous orbit,

which gets a little bit
of an arm stretch,

but about four feet away
from the Earth.

So what we're looking at here
is the geosynchronous belt.

It is the furthest orbit regime

that we typically use
for satellites.

NARRATOR:
In geosynchronous orbit,
around 22,000 miles up,

a satellite moves in perfect
sync with the Earth's rotation,

so it can stay
over a fixed point,

putting it in a perfect position

for telecommunications,
weather forecasting,

or spying.

SHAW:
It was Arthur C. Clarke,

a science fiction writer,

who started to formulate
this idea

that satellites that are
in orbit in that belt

are actually moving
around the Earth

at the same rate the Earth
is rotating.

And so they're always
in that same spot in the sky.

NARRATOR:
But some of the most
important satellites

sit between LEO and GEO,

in a relatively quiet realm
called medium-Earth orbit.

So, this is medium-Earth orbit,
or MEO,

and this is where
we have put our GPS satellites.

NARRATOR:
It's not hard to imagine
the disaster

if these suddenly
stopped working.

♪ ♪

PARIKH:
A Navy warship
is patrolling the ocean.

The ship is guided
by GPS satellites.

Suddenly,
the GPS signals go out.

They can't navigate,
they have decision uncertainty,

operations grind to a halt.

The ship
is a massive sitting duck

in the middle of the ocean.

NARRATOR:
In recent years, the U.S. Navy

has been preparing
for just such a scenario.

♪ ♪

CHILTON:
Sailors used to be taught
celestial navigation

to determine
where their ship was.

Well, they stopped doing that
when they got GPS.

Why waste their time doing that?

But there's a danger
in becoming too dependent

on a utility that's vulnerable
to attack from an adversary.

The Navy realized
there's a non-zero chance

that the Global Positioning
System

might not be operating
to our satisfaction.

Well, celestial navigation
was taught

for nearly 200 years
at the Naval Academy,

so they have reintroduced
the use of sextants.

CHILTON:
They want to have a backup

for a really bad day,

should our adversaries
take out the GPS constellation.

NARRATOR:
The Global Positioning System

is a group
of more than 30 satellites

in medium-Earth orbit,

about 12,000 miles
above the planet.

SHAW:
GPS was developed to solve
a targeting problem.

If you're
a ballistic m*ssile submarine,

and you surface and you're,
or come near the surface,

and you're ready
to launch your missiles,

how do you know where you are?

Well, a really nice way to do it

would be to get precise signals
from satellites in space.

NARRATOR:
Each satellite broadcasts
a radio signal

providing its location
and precise time

from an on-board atomic clock

accurate to within a billionth
of a second.

CHILTON:
GPS satellites are
all synchronized

on the same clock.

And they rely on communicating
that timing signal

back down
to the surface of the Earth.

And then our receiver
figures out the difference

of when we receive those signals
from different satellites

to calculate where we are
and how fast we're moving.

NARRATOR:
The 1990s Gulf w*r
was the first major conflict

that used GPS widely,

and it was a game changer.

It allowed
a precision of weaponry

that we had never seen before.

In World w*r II,
it took 1,000 bombs

to destroy a factory
that you were going after.

Whereas, in the early 1990s,

one airplane
could actually hit targets

with precision
with just a few bombs

that are GPS-guided.

So, that revolutionized warfare.

CHILTON:
Because it came out
of the military,

GPS was classified

and held
as a top-secret capability.

But eventually,

the U.S. government said,
"No, this is a utility

that should be provided
to the world."

NARRATOR:
At first, the accuracy
of the signal

made available to the public

was intentionally degraded.

BINNING: In the 1990s,

with the civilian version
of the signal,

300 feet was as accurate
as you could be.

In 2000, President Clinton
removed that limitation

for the civilian population.

And that opened up
all sorts of uses.

NARRATOR:
Today, anyone
with a GPS receiver

knows exactly where they are
nearly anywhere on Earth.

They also have access

to the satellites'
atomic clocks.

Modern banking relies
on these clocks

to precisely timestamp
every digital transaction,

from stock trades
to ATM withdrawals.

GPS is crucial
for both the modern economy

and modern warfare.

SHAW:
I had the privilege of having

the Global Positioning System
under my command

out at Schriever Space Force
Base in Colorado Springs.

And the center of GPS

is an operations floor
with eight people

that operate
that entire constellation

for both military
and civilian applications.

The U.S. is not alone in having
a global navigation system.

The European Union,
the Chinese, and the Russians

all have independent
constellations of satellites.

In fact,

your phone
is tracking satellites

from all four
of those constellations.

NARRATOR:
But these openly available
signals

leave a crucial technology
vulnerable to attack.

SHAW:
An adversary could want

to eliminate
those GPS satellites.

Right now, though,
we've seen adversaries,

when they want to counter
a navigation system from space,

do localized jamming
on the ground.

NARRATOR:
The radio signals
that GPS satellites send

are weak by the time
they reach the ground,

so local jammers broadcasting
on the same frequency

can easily drown them out.

SHAW:
It's actually happening
all over the world,

and it's affected
civilian air traffic.

A plane carrying
the E.U. Commission president,

Ursula von der Leyen,

was targeted by GPS jamming

while trying to land
in Bulgaria.

NARRATOR:
Russia regularly jams
over Europe,

and recently,
the U.S. has done the same

in the Caribbean
and Middle East.

But intentional interference

has extended beyond just GPS.

Good afternoon.

Russia launched cyberattacks
in late February

against commercial satellite
communications networks

in an effort to disrupt
Ukrainian command and control

during the invasion.

NARRATOR:
In the hours
before Russia invaded Ukraine

in February 2022,

Russia launched a cyberattack
that knocked out

satellite-based communications
and internet systems

across Ukraine.

Ukraine turned to Elon Musk,
the head of SpaceX

and owner of a satellite
constellation called Starlink,

for help.

SAMSON:
There were people
in the Ukrainian military

tweeting at Elon Musk directly,
saying,

"Can you please help us out?",
you know.

So, Elon was able
to snap his fingers

and get it into the country
very quickly.

NARRATOR:
Starlink provides
satellite-based internet

using a novel approach.

Instead of covering
the whole Earth

with a few large satellites
in geosynchronous orbit,

it uses a constellations
of small satellites

in low-Earth orbit.

So instead of sending a signal
all the way to geosynchronous

and bouncing it back down,

you just send it up a few
hundred miles and back down.

BINNING:
These satellites
are communicating

with their nearest neighbor,

and their nearest neighbor
is communicating

with their next-nearest
neighbor.

That makes this network happen.

NARRATOR:
Starlink brought Ukraine
back online

and helped level
the b*ttlefield.

BURBACH:
The Russians were not happy.

And the head
of the Russian Space Agency

even hinted
that Elon Musk personally

might be a legitimate
military target. [laughs]

NARRATOR:
As the w*r continued,
SpaceX appeared to be

limiting the service
for certain regions and uses.

There were a lot of people
that said,

"Look," you know, "it's kind of
scary that you can have

"this capability you depend upon
for your military,

"and it can just be turned off

"not because a government
has thought about it

"or a military has said,
'Okay, this meets our needs,'

but a private citizen."

It is concerning that one person
has so much control.

BINNING:
In 2025,

there were over 12,000
operating satellites on orbit.

About 70% of those are
from one U.S. company, SpaceX,

and their Starlink
constellation.

BURBACH:
SpaceX has been responsible

for probably around two-thirds
of national security launches

in recent years.

They're now putting up


at least once a week.

So, Elon Musk owns something
like three-quarters

of all the satellites that
the human race has operating.

NARRATOR:
SpaceX recently began
providing the U.S. military

with a customized version
of Starlink called Starshield.

It's one of several military
satellite constellations

being developed
for communications, spying,

m*ssile defense, and GPS.

BURBACH:
It's really an entirely
new paradigm,

having large numbers of
relatively disposable satellites

operating at a low altitude.

NARRATOR:
But even these satellites

might be vulnerable
to another kind of weapon

that people have long imagined--

lasers.

♪ ♪

PARIKH:
Imagine this.

A series of high-powered lasers

conduct a coordinated attack.

Ground based
and space-based weapons

hit our intelligence satellites.

They destroy optics
and fry electronics.

Suddenly, we can no longer see
behind enemy lines.

Our military
and intelligence services

are rendered blind.

NARRATOR:
General Atomics is one
of the world's largest

privately owned
defense companies.

In their lab
in San Diego, California,

Robert Peterkin demonstrates

how laser technologies
can be used

for military purposes.

Since the day
the laser was invented,

in 1960,

people have been imagining ways
to weaponize lasers.

NARRATOR:
Lasers work by amplifying
and aligning light particles

so all of the energy is focused

into a single,
concentrated beam.

One type of laser technology

has been deployed as a weapon
for years.

It's called "dazzling."

PETERKIN:
So this is the small laser

we're going to use
to demonstrate laser dazzling.

We're ready to go, so let's
turn off the laboratory lights.

I'm going to switch the laser on

and intercept the camera

located a couple of meters
across the room.

The green laser is about to hit
the aperture of the camera.

And on the camera,

you should start to see
some green laser light.

NARRATOR:
Many satellites rely
on optical sensors,

like those in digital cameras.

But these sensors
can be vulnerable.

PETERKIN:
As I continue to slightly move
the laser beam...

...I can obliterate the image.

The laser intensity
is overwhelming

the electronics in that camera,

but it causes no damage.

So when I move
the laser beam away,

the image reappears.

If my laser was powerful enough,

I could, in principle, dazzle
a satellite from the ground.

BURBACH:
Both the Russians
and the Chinese have

a truck-mounted
laser dazzling system

that is deployable--
they've, they've displayed them.

CHILTON:
It's a weapon--
it's a weapon system.

It's a kind of optical jamming,
if you will.

And we're seeing
our adversaries fielding this

because we see
the attempted interruptions

in our satellite systems.

NARRATOR:
The U.S., China, and Russia
are all known

to have laser dazzling systems,

though none have acknowledged
using them

against adversaries' satellites.

The U.S. has claimed
that both Russia and China

have used lasers to try and
dazzle American spy satellites,

possibly American commercial
imaging satellites.

Nobody wants
to give many details,

and they also don't, you know,
they don't want to...

You know, they don't want
to let the Russians know,

was the dazzling effective
or not.

NARRATOR:
And higher-powered lasers can
not only dazzle, but destroy,

though the details of the weapon
used for this test

remain restricted.

PETERKIN:
If the power
is sufficiently high

and I'm able to keep the beam
on the drone

for sufficiently long,

I can defeat the drone,

and this drone will then
fall to the ground

and will no longer be able
to bother me.

NARRATOR:
At close range,
a 30-kilowatt laser,

the equivalent
of 30 million laser pointers

concentrated into one beam,

can burn through solid steel.

PETERKIN:
This hole was made here,
in this laboratory,

with a laser of several tens
of kilowatts,

but the details
of how weapons-class lasers work

are held at
a higher classification level.

NARRATOR:
Laser weapons have been used
on land and at sea,

but putting them in space
is a challenge.

Lasers are large consumers
of power,

so you need large battery banks,
you need large solar arrays.

NARRATOR:
To date, no nation
has acknowledged

putting a laser weapon in space.

But because it can operate
over large distances,

and it's not attenuated
by an atmosphere,

directed energy will be
the weapon of choice

in future space combat.

NARRATOR:
But for now,

many military satellites
are potentially vulnerable

to large-scale attack
from a more conventional weapon.

♪ ♪

PARIKH:
Our spy satellites detect
a ballistic m*ssile launch.

But this isn't going
to the other side of the Earth.

This is going into space.

These weapon systems,

known as direct-ascent
anti-satellite weapons,

attack m*ssile-warning
satellites,

communication satellites,
intelligence satellites.

Within minutes,
these satellites are destroyed.

Our military and intelligence
services go dark.

NARRATOR:
At a Space Force base
in Colorado,

m*ssile defense units
use satellites

to scan
for infrared heat signatures

of enemy m*ssile launches

and coordinate intercepts.

CHILTON:
With a handful
of these satellites in orbit,

we can surveil the whole world

and see any rocket launch
anywhere on the planet.

NARRATOR:
An attack on these satellites
could open the door

for undetected m*ssile launches.

SHAW:
There's been five anti-satellite
m*ssile operations

done so far.

And the first was actually
conducted by the United States.

NARRATOR:
In 1985, the U.S. launched
an anti-satellite rocket

from an F-*5 fighter

and blew
one of its old satellites

into hundreds of pieces.

At the time, the Soviet Union
had a good number

of satellites operating
in low-Earth orbit

that they were going to use

in a potential conflict
with the United States.

And we were motivated
at the time to say,

"How do we deprive them
of that capability?"

NARRATOR:
The test served
as a cautionary tale,

not only for the Soviet Union,

but for anyone
with hardware in space.

It's relatively easy
to blow up a satellite,

but that generates tons
of debris.

And that makes space unusable
for everyone.

NARRATOR:
Despite the risks,

in 2007, China used a m*ssile

to destroy one of their own
defunct satellites.

JAMES CLAPPER:
There are countries
who are pursuing

very aggressive, very impressive

counter-space capabilities,
which I cannot go into here

because of classification
restrictions.

♪ ♪

CHILTON:
People talk about hitting
a b*llet with a b*llet.

The satellite you're sh**ting at

is probably traveling
at about 17,000 miles an hour.

And if you're coming at it
from the opposite direction

at 5,000 miles an hour, you,

that's a, that's an incredibly
high closure rate.

And kinetic energy is equal

to one-half mass
times velocity squared.

That's a big velocity squared.

So you produce a tremendous
amount of kinetic energy

at impact

that just totally obliterates
the satellite

and creates
this large field of debris.

NARRATOR:
The Chinese satellite strike

created thousands of pieces
of orbiting debris.

And the farther an object is
from Earth,

the less gravity and atmospheric
drag it encounters,

so the longer it stays in orbit.

Now, that altitude
was 500 miles.

And debris at that altitude
is going to persist

for tens of years,
if not a century or longer.

NARRATOR:
Just a year later,
the U.S. announced

that a disabled
American satellite

around 130 miles up

carrying highly toxic
rocket fuel

was in danger
of falling to Earth.

And so the U.S. said,
"You know what?

"We have this satellite
that's not working.

"It's filled with this chemical.

"We don't know
where it's going to crash.

"It'd be bad
for people's health.

We better sh**t it down."

NARRATOR:
Officials were concerned

that the satellite's
hydrazine fuel tank

might survive reentry
and crash in a populated area.

A mission was given
to U.S. Strategic Command,

where I was at the time.

And this was truly a mission
to protect humans.

JAMES CARTWRIGHT:
You'll see the intercept,
you'll see the hit of the mass.

There you go.

And what we're watching
right now is this cloud

that's forming right here.

SAMSON:
The U.S. will swear up and down
it was a safety hazard.

I've always said, "Well, clearly
they were doing this operation

in response to the Chinese."

I can tell you
that was not the intent

of the mission at all.

But if I was putting myself
in a pair of Chinese shoes,

I would, I would assume
that that was,

there was a demonstration there.

NARRATOR:
Some questioned whether
the sh**t down was necessary,

but because the satellite
was relatively low,

the debris quickly reentered
the atmosphere and burned up.

Then, in 2019,

India shot down a test satellite
with a m*ssile,

and, in 2021,

just three months
before invading Ukraine,

Russia made a move.

SHAW:
I was actually
on the operations floor

at United States Space Command
in November of 2021.

And I was dismayed
as we saw the launch happen.

♪ ♪

BINNING: The Russians
kinetically intercepted

Cosmos 1408,

which was a defunct
intelligence satellite.

SHAW:
And we started to see
that we no longer had

one target satellite,
but a field of debris.

My assessment is that they
conducted an actual intercept

just to prove they could do it

and say that, that no one
could keep them from doing it.

NARRATOR:
Russia defended the test
and accused the U.S.

of accelerating
the militarization of space.

They did it at an altitude
of 250 miles,

which happened to be
the same altitude

as the International Space
Station.

MAN [over radio]:
Hey, Mark, good morning.

Sorry for the early call.

We were recently informed
of a satellite breakup

and need to have you guys

start reviewing
the safe-haven procedure.

BINNING:
NASA required the astronauts

to shelter
in their emergency spacecraft

and they had to begin
maneuvering

the International Space Station

to avoid this debris.

NARRATOR:
The astronauts were unscathed,

but for months, the space
station had to maneuver

to stay clear of the fragments.

SHAW: Much of that debris
has fallen out of orbit already,

but a lot remains.

We're still tracking
hundreds of pieces of debris

from that particular event.

NARRATOR:
So far, nations have only

shot and hit
their own satellites.

But given the danger posed

by a single tiny fragment
of debris,

the prospect of a full-scale,
anti-satellite

m*ssile battle in space

is daunting.

♪ ♪

PARIKH:
A massive barrage
of anti-satellite missiles

creates tens of thousands
of pieces of debris.

This is when
the nightmare scenario begins.

Known as the Kessler Syndrome,
this debris cascades

and intersects
with other satellites,

causing them to be destroyed,
causing more debris.

And in a self-perpetuating
chain reaction,

thousands of satellites
get destroyed.

NARRATOR:
Chain reaction or not,

space junk is already a problem.

BINNING:
Just because you're up there
moving 17,000 miles an hour

doesn't mean everything
is moving

in the same direction as you.

In fact, very little is moving
in the same direction as you.

Orbits all have different
orientations.

So it's not about the pieces
that are in your orbit,

it's about the pieces
that are at your altitude

but have different
orbital paths.

And the biggest risk
is the piece coming at you

from a perpendicular direction

that's going to hit you
at 17,000 miles an hour.

NARRATOR:
Space junk comes in all sizes,

from spent rocket stages,
to defunct satellites,

to lost astronaut gloves,
to errant screws.

GRAZIANI:
Recently, a small untracked
piece of debris

hit the Chinese space station.

It hit their evacuation module

that they were planning
to go back home on.

There was no loss of life,

but it could have been
much worse.

A massive collision between
two satellites happened in 2009.

A U.S. communications satellite
inadvertently hit

a defunct Russian satellite

and it created
an enormous debris field.

NARRATOR:
It's not clear
how close we are

to reaching a Kessler threshold

that could start
a chain reaction

and render orbits unusable.

Or if we'll ever get there.

BINNING:
Space is enormously vast.

Even though there are
more than 12,000 satellites

and tens of thousands
of more pieces of debris,

stuff is not constantly
bumping into each other.

NARRATOR:
Others believe
the chain reaction

is already underway,

even if it looks different
than in the movies.

MCDOWELL:
In the movie "Gravity,"

everything got shredded
in about half-an-hour.

But really, this happens
over decades.

Like most
environmental disasters,

it's a very slow-moving
car crash.

I think the Kessler chain
reaction is already happening.

Certainly,
in some orbital regimes,

there's enough debris

that it's not the problem
of just waiting

to see if things hit each other

and statistically
calculating the probability,

it's, how good are
your dodge maneuver schemes

and, and how, how well can you
control the flow of traffic.

NARRATOR:
Most satellites rely
on solar panels

to power
their onboard electronics.

But they also carry
small amounts of fuel

to enable maneuvering
with thrusters.

BINNING:
In 2025, SpaceX had to do


to make sure their spacecraft
did not impact

either a piece of debris
or another satellite.

MCDOWELL:
So this is really getting,
I think,

to the edge of being tenable.

I really worry, if we go
from 10,000 satellites

to 100,000 satellites,

it may no longer be possible
to successfully do

all the dodging that's needed.

I think we're going
to learn the hard way.

NARRATOR:
Most new satellites
are equipped with thrusters,

but the same technology that
can help satellites maneuver

can also enable
another kind of attack.

♪ ♪

PARIKH:
Imagine a number
of small, agile satellites

approaching some of our
key national security assets.

Suddenly, we start
losing communications.

GPS starts getting jammed.

Other satellites are being moved
out of their orbits.

It's hard to know
exactly what's happening,

but it's clear these attacks
are something new.

NARRATOR:
Governments rarely talk openly

about military operations
in space,

but in Southern California,

one private company has glimpsed

some of the cutting-edge
technologies

that are driving space warfare.

ExoAnalytic runs a network

of small optical telescopes
that track objects

in geosynchronous orbit,
more than 22,000 miles up.

MJ Jeffries
oversees the network.

So here at ExoAnalytic,

we operate a global network
of telescopes.

On the map right here,

you're seeing all
of our observatories.

We're in South Africa,
Morocco, Spain,

France, Greece.

We have them smattered
across Australia,

the United States and Hawaii.

We're also down here
in both Argentina and Chile.

The telescope network
is a series of 40 observatories,

all around the world,
about 400 telescopes total.

So right now I'm going
to click into telescope 1818.

If you look at the map,
in the lower left-hand corner,

it shows you that we have
a target symbol

around Western Australia,

and that's where
this observatory is.

And I can go in and zoom in
on the night sky in real time.

Now, as I zoom in,
we're seeing a live picture

coming in from the telescope.

I can jump over
to a telescope in Morocco,

come over here to France--
any of them are at our disposal.

NARRATOR:
ExoAnalytic can detect

the light reflected
by even small objects

from 22,000 miles away.

With one telescope
and one picture,

we can see something
about this size,

but using ten telescopes
co-located,

and putting all those frames
together,

we can track something down
about this size.

All of the observations
that we take

with a part
of our telescope network

are what's called
"not classified,"

because it's just a passive
collection of the night sky.

So right now,
that's about 700 active objects.

Now, of those 700 objects,


in the public catalogue.

NARRATOR:
These 30 objects include

classified reconnaissance
and military satellites

that the Space Force
doesn't publicly discuss.

But because it's hard
to hide in space,

even the infrared detection
satellites

that anchor the U.S. m*ssile
defense system, called SBIRS,

are visible.

JEFFRIES:
Currently, we're tracking
SBIRS GEO-4, parked up at GEO.

And we can see
that it's positioned

above the African continent.

Since it's a geostationary
satellite,

it always maintains
this same position.

It doesn't move to the left
or move to the right.

NARRATOR:
And sometimes,
ExoAnalytic finds surprises.

In 2021,
China launched a satellite

into geosynchronous orbit.

The stated purpose of Shijian,
or SJ-21,

was debris removal.

JEFFRIES:
So this gets launched up,
it arrived at GEO,

and it does a maneuver to go
and rendezvous

around another Chinese satellite
called Compass G2.

And then it goes and actually
captures Compass G2.

MCDOWELL:
So you've got these two objects,
right,

that are orbiting the Earth
at thousands of miles an hour,

and you've got to move them
close to one another

with imperfect knowledge, right,
about what their orbits are

so that when they touch,
they don't hit each other

at, like, 100 miles an hour, right?

That would be bad.

JEFFRIES:
So you can see right now,
you have SJ-21

and you have Compass G2
next to it that's spinning.

In a moment here,
you're going to see,

instead of that square spinning,
it's going to be stuck.

Now it's stuck.

NARRATOR:
SJ-21 may have grabbed onto the
other satellite with an arm,

a maneuver ExoAnalytic
had never seen before.

JEFFRIES:
That was a pretty big deal.

So now we have to ask ourselves,
what are they going to do?

NARRATOR:
Suddenly, after weeks
of orbiting together,

both satellites disappeared.

JEFFRIES:
In January 2022,

I went to go see the location
of SJ-21

and there was nothing there.

So it was a pretty big effort
for our team

to go and refind the satellite,

but once we did,
we saw that SJ-21

was moving very quickly
east to west.

BINNING:
Like a tow truck,
SJ-21 grabbed another satellite

and moved it 2,000 miles,
stopped, released it,

and then SJ-21 returned


to the geosynchronous belt.

MCDOWELL: China is doing

some very cutting-edge things
in space

and demonstrating capabilities

that I think the U.S.
in general,

and the D.o.D. in particular,

wishes it had.

And so that's causing
some, some concerns.

NARRATOR:
China insists they disposed
of a defunct satellite

as part
of a debris removal test.

But many instead saw
a public demonstration

of a tool easy to repurpose
for offense

in the event of a conflict.

Yeah, it, it's worrisome.

Of course, they, they'll tell
you it's for peaceful purposes.

SHAW:
The United States has not done
anything like that.

And that alone
would've been remarkable

for the career of SJ-21.

NARRATOR:
But then, in January 2025,

China launched
another satellite, SJ-25,

to rendezvous with SJ-21.

JEFFRIES:
And then sure enough,
right around July of 2025,

we saw them dock.

The publicly available
information states

that SJ-25 is some sort
of a refueling satellite.

SHAW:
There was a fuel transfer
from SJ-25 to SJ-21

that replenished its tanks.

BINNING:
Remember, in space,

if you want
to get somewhere fast,

you have to spend a lot of fuel.

Fuel is the most important
expendable resource

that you have.

Fuel determines
how often you can maneuver,

how fast you can maneuver.

And you can imagine,

if you no longer had fuel
as a limiter,

what you could do.

SHAW:
My response to seeing SJ-21
do the towing operation

and then do
the refueling operation

was kind of some respect.

And it was a realization

to never underestimate
your adversary.

NARRATOR:
Grabbing a satellite in orbit

isn't the only way
to mess with it.

In 2019, observers tracked
the launch

of a Russian satellite

and noticed something odd.

The single dot showing
the satellite

soon split into two,
and then into three.

GRAZIANI:
Russia is unique
in using a technique

of deploying spacecraft
from other spacecraft.

You can see as many as three
of these nesting dolls,

or matryoshka dolls,

where one satellite
will release another,

and that'll release a third.

That object could be anything.

It could be a kinetic weapon
that's intended to impact.

It could be a weapon
that's intended to jam.

You just don't know.

NARRATOR: Russia claims
these "nesting doll" satellites

are intended to inspect
other satellites for damage.

But COMSPOC has observed them
following

classified U.S. satellites,

at times coming within 50 miles.

There's no other reason
to come up close

to one of our very sensitive
and important satellites

than for bad intent.

What they're trying to do
is intimidate us

and let us know that if we got
into a conflict,

that those satellites
would cease to exist.

NARRATOR:
Small, mobile satellites
that can attack

in a variety of ways

might be the future
of space warfare.

♪ ♪

PARIKH:
With little warning,

hundreds of satellites deploy
on-orbit weapons

against our national security
space assets:

jamming, lasing,

kinetic effects,
cyber intrusions.

Billions of dollars
of national security satellites

are rendered useless,

leaving our military
back on Earth crippled.

NARRATOR:
Even Rogers is a founder of
satellite maker True Anomaly.

He's racing to build
small, agile satellites

that might be key
to this new style of warfare.

Spacecraft subsystems
have become less expensive

and they've become smaller.

Which allows you to deploy more
satellites at a single launch

than you would previously,

where a single launch
was dedicated

to a single billion-dollar
spacecraft.

So we build them smaller,
build them cheaper.

NARRATOR:
This new spacecraft
is called Jackal.

ROGERS:
Jackal's a multi-role
space superiority platform.

It's designed to track
and follow highly agile targets.

As our adversaries have built

more and more
highly maneuverable systems,

we've needed to adapt to that.

NARRATOR:
Jackal has extra fuel tanks
and highly efficient thrusters

that give it
more maneuverability and range

than most
traditional satellites.

ROGERS:
So these are

the tiny little rocket engines
that allow the Jackal spacecraft

to move from point A to point B
within an orbit.

SARAH WALTER:
Cleanliness is really important,

because if you get dirt
or particulates

inside those thrusters,

it can cause jamming
and leakage of fuel.

ROGERS:
So these have a lot of thrust
that allow us

to really quickly maneuver

and get into position
to go perform

whatever mission it is
that we need to go do.

NARRATOR:
It's designed
to get close to a target,

for now carrying a camera,

but ultimately, perhaps,
a jammer,

or even a laser weapon.

There's no technological barrier
to deploying a laser on Jackal.

The question is, how far away
do you need the target to be

to engage it.

If it's very close,
that technology exists.

If it's very far away,

that's a pretty significant
technological hurdle.

But for most engagements, you
know, a handful of kilometers,

a space-to-space laser
is totally achievable.

NARRATOR:
Carrying even simple weapons,
maneuverable, cheap satellites

can potentially take out
billion-dollar behemoths.

They can lie dormant in space
for months or years

and be hard to identify
as weapons.

BURBACH:
This ability to have lots
of satellites

that can interact
with each other,

that, that is going to be
a very different sort of future

than what we've been used to
in Earth orbit.

NARRATOR:
International agreements
are few and far between

when it comes
to the militarization of space.

Nothing governs how close one
satellite can get to another,

or most of what companies
and governments do up there.

All of those things
from the Wild West era, right,

are going to happen in space
if we don't

prepare for them.

NARRATOR:
The main international
agreement,

the Outer Space Treaty of 1967,

prohibits nuclear weapons,

but says nothing about
conventional weapons in space.

And while the U.S., Russia,
and China

are all party to the treaty,

there have been
no major new agreements since.

SAMSON:
Space is a shared domain,

and actions by one actor
can affect everyone's ability

to utilize space.

There's a lot of work being done
in diplomatic circles

on space issues.

But at the United Nations,

they've been going in circles,
frankly, for decades now.

I think the likelihood

of any arms control for space
in the near term

is pretty low.

I'm actually pretty pessimistic.

I'm afraid we are headed
towards a higher level

of militarization
and weaponization of space.

NARRATOR:
In 2025, the White House
mandated the development

of a new space-based
m*ssile defense system

called "Golden Dome."

The Golden Dome will be capable
of intercepting missiles

even if they are launched
from other sides of the world

and even if they are launched
from space.

NARRATOR:
The program is supposed
to include a constellation

of satellites that can
actively sh**t down missiles.

Critics have pointed out

that, besides the many technical
challenges involved,

Golden Dome would be
a major escalation.

Satellites that can sh**t down
missiles

can easily be aimed
at other satellites.

SHAW: We have not yet seen
satellite-to-satellite attacks.

I think those will happen
in the future.

CHILTON: What if
I had a satellite

that had
a mechanical arm

and it could grab
another satellite?

Would that be a weapon?

Well, I used to fly that weapon.

It's called the space shuttle.

But it wasn't built
to be a weapon.

So we don't even have
a good definition

of what is a weapon and
what is not a weapon in space.

We're now, in my mind,
thinking about space warfare

as we thought about air warfare
in the 1920s.

We are so early in the testing
and training

that it's not even quite clear

how this whole thing
will play itself out.

NARRATOR:
As technology progresses,
it's up to humankind

to decide how to use it.

But what's increasingly clear

is that it's no longer possible
to ignore

what's happening
above our heads.

There has not been a domain
that human beings

have not figured out
a way to fight in:

underwater, on top of the water,

on land, in the air.

Why is space any different?

♪ ♪

♪ ♪

♪ ♪