Making best use of space
The Air Force is making increased use of spacebased technology, writes WGCDR Chris Miller

The world has changed a lot in the past 100 years.

Just 11 years after the first flight of an aircraft in 1903, aeroplanes were being used in World War I.

It was inevitable that as soon as man first propelled a satellite into space in 1957, this technology would be used by the military.

As we saw in Iraq last year, satellites in space are now vital to the United States military.

But given that the RAAF doesn’t own any space-based assets, how can that affect us?

Technician The Air Force actually uses satellites far more than most people realise. We rely on satellites for navigation, communications, intelligence and weather information.

Our weather forecasts rely on information obtained from the Australian Bureau of Meteorology, which in turn receives the information from commercial satellites belonging to Japan, China and the USA.

We use American Global Positioning System (GPS) satellites for navigation.

Other satellite-based navigation systems in the world include the Russian GLONASS system and the Chinese Beidou system.

In the future, we can expect a European alternative called Galileo, which is expected to be compatible with GPS. Satellite communications are well suited to long distances, remote regions and mobile users.

The Air Force uses a defence-owned communications payload on the Optus C1 commercial satellite. We also lease communications services from other commercial satellites to support deployed operations.

In the future, we can expect to see increased use of satellite communications to support equipment such as the Global Hawk Unmanned Aerial Vehicle and AEW&C aircraft.

Commercial satellite imagery can be used by the Air Force for intelligence purposes. For example, the US-owned Quickbird satellite produces commercially available imagery of about half a metre resolution. This is suffi cient for most targeting needs.

So, what can we expect in the future? The Air Force will use satellite communication, navigation and imagery capabilities to a greater extent. Satellites will become smaller, cheaper and more capable.

Commercial satellite services will become increasingly available to support our intelligence and other requirements. Other uses may be introduced, such as satellites allowing us to better track our own forces, thus reducing the danger of accidentally targeting our own forces in the heat of battle, which is termed “blue-on-blue” or fratricide.

As you can see, even though we don’t own any satellites, space contributes a surprising amount to the Air Force.

As satellite technology inevitably advances, we will focus more and more on the space environment in the future.

• Wing Commander Chris Miller is the Deputy Director Space Future Concepts at the Air Power Development Centre.

.