APOGEE STAFF
At a time when space power was emerging as the difference between winning and losing on the battlefield, NATO gave up its satellites. The United States had demonstrated the military value of capabilities such as GPS, precision-guided munitions and satellite communication in 1990 during Operation Desert Storm — what many historians refer to as the first U.S. space war. And as far back as 1970, NATO, the alliance born after World War II to protect Europe against the Soviet Union, had owned and operated its own satellites. Then, in 2005, NATO decided on a different approach: Save money and accelerate innovation by leveraging the work of its spacefaring member nations.
During the two decades since then, as those nations fielded increasingly sophisticated capabilities, NATO has focused its space mission instead on the sharing, coordination and interoperability of data its members produce. During the past five years, in particular, following a global trend, the alliance has moved to incorporate space into its military strategy and operations. “Achieving and maintaining space superiority should be NATO’s mission,” said Laryssa Patten, a leader at the NATO Communications and Information Agency (NCIA), the alliance’s technology and cyber hub. “It’s about strengthening cooperatively and collectively but contributing individually. That will keep everyone safe.”
In 2024, as the alliance marked its 75th year, the NATO space transformation is under way on a number of fronts. Perhaps the most ambitious is Alliance Persistent Surveillance from Space (APSS), establishing a large-scale, virtual constellation of national and commercial surveillance satellites to monitor activities on the ground and at sea, according to NATO’s website. The constellation will be called Aquila, Latin for eagle. Seventeen of NATO’s 32 nations signed onto APSS during the July 2024 NATO Summit in Washington, D.C., and more are expected to join, Patten told Apogee. APSS is described as the alliance’s largest-ever multinational investment in space-based capabilities, launched with an $18 million grant from member nation Luxembourg.
APSS will complement another NATO initiative under development, the Strategic Space Situational Awareness System (3SAS). The 3SAS program will monitor space events and their effects across air, sea, land and cyberspace, consistent with NATO’s declaration in November 2019 that space is an operational domain. “I like to describe APSS as a program that uses space assets and looks down,” said Patten, program manager for APSS and a 12-year veteran of NATO space, “and 3SAS is a space situational awareness program from the ground and from space — looking up.”
Different approaches
When it comes to space security, each NATO nation has its own distinct capabilities and motivations. Leading spacefaring nations such as France, Germany, Italy, Spain and the United Kingdom followed the lead of the U.S. and created their own military space components. Luxembourg, smaller in size and population, is helping to provide satellite communications, funding new programs and “has had significant impact” on NATO, Patten said. “Because NATO doesn’t own space assets, any activity that the NATO nations do to strengthen their own space posture strengthens NATO’s position,” she said.
More than half of active satellites orbiting the Earth belong to NATO members or companies based in their territory, the alliance said on its website. But the U.S. accounts for the lion’s share of these spacecraft and the U.K. more than half of the 780 others, according to a July 2023 report by Italian Air Force Lt. Col. Emma Palombi, published by the U.S. Air Force’s Air University. Ten NATO nations have no satellites, the report said. The different approaches are reflected in certain policies, as well, involving issues such as fielding space weapons. Germany and others have expressed skepticism about pursuing them while France and the United States — both citing close approaches to their space assets by Russian satellites — have taken steps to develop capabilities that would disable rather than destroy satellites, such as pulses, lasers and microwaves. France called the Russian incursion on one of its military communications satellites in 2018 an “act of espionage.” The NATO nations’ differing views led to a reluctance on Berlin’s part to share data from its military surveillance satellites, Breaking Defense reported in 2019.
“For some countries in Europe, the question of strategic autonomy is more important in the political discourse,” Mathieu Bataille, then a research fellow with the European Space Policy Institute (ESPI) in Vienna, Austria, told Apogee in May 2024. “We want to be able to do things by ourselves in case our traditional allies decide, for one reason or another, not to follow us on the space topic.” Bataille, a Frenchman, cited as an example his nation’s decision to develop the GRAVES space surveillance radar system rather than rely completely on allies’ assets, like the Space Surveillance System operated by U.S. Space Force. “I really believe there is a global trend toward developing your own capabilities,” said Bataille, now with the European Space Agency. “So, you can negotiate or exchange data with other countries on an equal basis — not be a junior partner every time.”
Member nations and NATO command also find themselves chasing the same limited pool of skilled space operators, who were identified as a top priority by alliance representatives during the April 2024 Space Symposium in Colorado Springs, Colorado. Space superiority “requires more than technology and equipment, it also requires a skilled workforce — space analysts, operators, engineers and strategists,” French Air and Space Force Gen. Philippe Lavigne, then NATO’s Supreme Allied Commander Transformation, told the symposium. “This is a challenge for NATO and our member nations as we work to identify and retain the talents needed to succeed in this new domain.”
Added Bataille, “In space, NATO lacks a lot of knowledge in the workforce and they need to hire some people. The thing is that member states are not necessarily willing to let their nationals go there because they need them, as well.”
Sum greater than parts
Still, in space as with all other domains throughout the alliance’s history, balancing sovereign interests with those of collective defense “is one of the key ways that NATO operates,” Patten said. “To use the capabilities of the nations in order to combine them in a manner with the sum being greater than the parts.” Throughout history, The Wall Street Journal noted in an April 2024 NATO profile, military alliances — including those that defeated Napoleon and won World War II — “involved allied armies operating separately under common command. NATO’s objective is to prepare allies to fight side-by-side.” Added Patten, “NATO benefits from the diversity among its nations, that they’re not all following the same path. Each country is cultivating its own expertise, advancing military space capabilities, and they’re strengthening their commercial sectors. Those varied approaches appear to be the strategies nations are applying.”
Incorporating space into defense strategies, in fact, has led to a “cultural shift within the intelligence community in general that is needed to improve the sharing between nations and among intelligence professionals,” Patten said. The Russian invasion of Ukraine in February 2022 helped hasten this trend, she said, as commercial space operators who aren’t subject to military classification revealed publicly the moves of the invaders in real time. “Companies like Maxar and others have significantly shown the transparency of space, so what is perceived to be intelligence is now featured on the front page of CNN,” she said. “That has contributed to changing some of the traditional paradigms of intelligence.”
Member nations will rely on NATO to help answer the threats to rules-based world order posed by space powers Russia, the People’s Republic of China (PRC) and their authoritarian allies, Lavigne told the Space Symposium. “Unlike in the past, dominance in space will not be achieved by a single nation deploying vast fleets of spacecraft,” Maj. Gen. Philippe Adam, the French Air and Space Force space commander, said in May 2024. “NATO’s strength lies in its collective power. … We are working tirelessly to make sure that our member nations’ military capabilities, including those in space, are fully interoperable and seamlessly integrated.”
The alliance also draws strength from a growing commitment to space defense shown by Europe, partners worldwide and NATO members’ multilateral agreements. One example is the IRIS2 Satellite Constellation, scheduled for deployment by the European Union in 2027 and featuring hundreds of spacecraft spanning three orbital ranges to provide secure communication services to the EU and its member states and broadband connectivity for European citizens, private companies and governmental authorities. Overall, the EU — whose 27 members roughly overlap with NATO — has announced grants of some $800 million over seven years for space projects. What’s more, the EU is increasing the military dimension of existing systems such as Copernicus, its Earth observation constellation — now “available to the defense community for ‘dual-use’ applications,” the system’s web page said.
Strengthened by partners
The EU also operates Europe’s vital Galileo satellite navigation system as well as the Space Surveillance and Tracking Service, consisting of eight member nations and 51 sensors. Added NATO’s Patten, “The EU and NATO recognize the importance of space and we collaborate through policy coordination, information sharing and technology development.” Another major space actor is the European Space Agency, which largely conducts scientific missions for the agency’s 22 member states but also manages and funds Europe’s Ariane rocket program. European militaries are counting on the new Ariane 6 to orbit payloads they’re planning.
The EU fostered the creation in April 2024 of the European Space Information Sharing and Analysis Centre, a platform promoting collaboration, awareness and best practices to protect commercial space systems from cyberattack. A dozen companies including defense giants Airbus and Leonardo joined as founding members. The U.S. Space ISAC has grown to more than 130 members, many from Europe, since it was established in 2019. This independent, nonprofit group has engaged with NATO and will work closely with its new European counterpart, in part by bringing members into the U.S. Watch Center at Colorado Springs. “It’s a bidirectional sharing agreement where they can access the resources we have and use our information-sharing portal,” Erin Miller, the U.S. group’s director, told Apogee. U.S. Space ISAC aims to grow into a worldwide security network.
Multilateral agreements that help strengthen NATO’s space defenses include U.S. Space Command’s (USSPACECOM) Combined Space Operation (CSpO) center, whose 10 members include eight of the alliance’s nations. “CSpO is a key forum through which we will improve coordination between our respective space centers, communicate via shared secure satellite systems, contribute to a unified common operating picture through space data sharing and engage in international space exercises,” according to a February 2024 report on the U.S. European Command’s website. The command also noted U.S. partnerships to increase satellite communication capability with Denmark, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, Norway and Poland; the installation of space situational awareness systems in Poland and Romania; and the deployment of defensive space systems throughout Europe. In addition, the U.S. committed in 2024 to support development of a space operations center in Poland.
NATO deepened its relations with four Indo-Pacific partners during the Washington summit, the third consecutive summit attended by the leaders of Australia, Japan, New Zealand and South Korea. Australia, Japan and New Zealand are members of CSpO. All four nations are gaining prominence as NATO allies at a time when the PRC and Russia are forging closer ties to counter the U.S. and as the two Koreas support opposing sides in the Ukraine war, the Associated Press reported. “Increasingly, partners in Europe see challenges halfway around the world in Asia as being relevant to them, just as partners in Asia see challenges halfway around the world in Europe as being relevant to them,” then-U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken said in the week before the summit.
NATO space components
Other key institutions and collaborations created by the alliance include the NATO Space Centre, founded in 2020 at Allied Air Command in Ramstein, Germany. The center works closely with allied nations’ space agencies and organizations, and with the NATO command structure, to fuse services such as imagery, navigation and early warning. Experts from Germany, the Netherlands, Spain, the U.K. and the U.S. staff the center. “By streamlining requests for space products through a single NATO entity,” the center’s website said, “we can increase the speed, efficiency and effectiveness of commanders’ decisions.”
The concluding declaration for the July 2024 Washington NATO Summit warns against space threats from Russia and the PRC and includes this goal: “Accelerating the integration of space into our planning, exercises, and multi-domain operations, in particular by strengthening the capacity of NATO’s Space Operations Centre.” In 2023, the NATO Space Centre of Excellence was established in Toulouse, France, to train and educate leaders and specialists from NATO members and partner countries. It is one of 30 centers of excellence across the alliance, in fields ranging from air operations to strategic communication.
Helping integrate the rapidly evolving commercial space sector into NATO’s collective defense was the goal of two events staged by the alliance in 2024. At the Space Reverse Industry Day in Brussels during February, space-related companies from 20 NATO nations took part in discussions on the challenges of working with the public sector, new multinational space investments, NATO’s defense accelerator organization and space interoperability. During May, NATO piggybacked on the annual Space Symposium, which draws more than 10,000 attendees from 40 countries, by holding the first NATO Space Symposium in Toulouse. More than 27 NATO nations were represented among the 300 people attending the symposium, where topics included commercial integration as well as adding space capabilities to planning and operations and defining the alliance’s long-term vision for space, said a news release from USSPACECOM. And in June, NATO drew commanders from 27 member nations to its second Space Commanders conference at Ramstein.
NATO’s Lavigne also noted the alliance’s commitment to training, as seen in the attendance of member nations at two intensive space defense exercises — USSPACECOM’s two-week Global Sentinel 2024 in February and the French Space Command’s AsterX in March. “We must foster trust and cooperation among the alliance to accelerate the development of compatibility and interoperability of allied space services’ products and capabilities,” Lavigne said.
Also undergoing transformation are the satellite communications that connect NATO forces during operations on the ground. The number of member nations providing the service will expand from four to six next year with the addition of Spain and Luxembourg to the NATO SATCOM Services 6th Generation program, or NSS6G, according to a June 2024 news release from the U.S. Department of Defense (DOD). When it gave up its own satellites, NATO turned to member states France, Italy and the U.K to provide satellite communications. Fifteen years later, in 2020, the U.S. joined the team.
Adding two more countries now puts about a dozen military communications satellites at NATO’s disposal. “It’s not NATO nations who will directly use the capability provided by NSSG6,” DOD said, “but rather NATO headquarters itself when it runs NATO-sanctioned operations.” NATO plans to spend $1 billion overall through 2034 to make satellite communications faster and more secure. Another recent NATO initiative: Protect the internet from disruption by rerouting the flow of information through satellites in case undersea cables are attacked or accidentally severed. Joining the alliance in this effort, announced in August 2024 and called HEIST for the Hybrid Space/Submarine Architecture Ensuring Infosec of Telecommunications, are three universities and NATO members Iceland, Sweden and the U.S., plus ally Switzerland.
Guiding principles
Underlying many of the alliance’s recent moves in the space domain are two documents — NATO’s overarching Space Policy, adopted by its defense ministers in June 2019, and the NATO 2022 Strategic Concept. The Space Policy outlines principles, space-related threats and NATO’s overall approach to space. One month after its adoption, the leaders of NATO member nations declared space a fifth operational domain, alongside air, land, maritime and cyberspace.
The Space Policy was amended at the 2021 NATO Summit in Brussels to add “attacks to, from, or within space” to Article 5 of the foundational North Atlantic Treaty — that an armed attack against one member nation is considered an attack against all. No adversary is mentioned by name in the Space Policy, published before Russia’s invasion of NATO candidate Ukraine. But the Strategic Concept, published four months after the invasion and with space as a central theme, identifies Russia — as well as its “deepening strategic partnership” with the PRC — as a threat to stability in the Euro-Atlantic region. The policy also outlines the political and military tasks NATO will carry out to address these threats.
Adding outer space to Article 5 ranks as a milestone in the alliance’s history, Lavigne said. “NATO was founded in 1949 on a solid promise: An attack on one ally is an attack on all. From that foundation, we have built the strongest and most successful alliance in history. … We have kept our 1 billion citizens safe by continuously evolving.” What actions might constitute an armed space attack remain understandably vague, said ESPI fellow Bataille. Too clear a line would create a “threshold that could be close to war … but if you are not clear enough, it becomes more difficult to decide when you want to activate it.”
Russia has stepped up its jamming of GPS signals across Europe during the war in Ukraine, including attacks that forced the temporary closure of Estonia’s second-largest airport and have hurt parts of neighboring Latvia and Lithuania, sites in Finland and Sweden over the Baltic Sea, and as far away as Poland and Germany, according to data from commercial aircraft posted at gps.org. All are NATO members. In his opinion, Bataille said, “Jamming a satellite would not trigger Article 5 because it’s common practice now. But then does the destruction of a satellite, a physical object that does not create any human loss, justify the triggering of Article 5?”
Overall, though, clarity is a key requirement as NATO integrates space capabilities into its operations, agreed military leaders from the alliance’s four largest space operators — France, Italy, the U.K. and the U.S. — during the Prague Space Security Conference in June 2024. “I think that we are in the right path, creating synergies and optimizing systems and capabilities together,” said Col. Giuseppe Gentile, chief of Italy’s Space Policy and Innovation Branch. “What we should do better is try to define a way [toward] collective response to the new kind of threat that could develop,” Gentile said, as reported by Breaking Defense. “We should agree also on some important definitions of what is the threat, what is our responsibility? Once we are agreed on that, then we can move forward to a collective response.” Another priority, he said: Avoid duplication in building new military capabilities. “We need to … be synchronized in what we are aiming to develop for the future.”
The future is commercial
Another next step is developing a commercial space strategy, using recommendations submitted by a NATO-sponsored government-industry working group made up of representatives from Finland, France, Luxembourg, Spain and the U.S. The group’s work was presented to a defense industry forum held on the eve of the NATO Washington summit, Breaking Defense reported. Recommendations include establishing an industry interface to engage companies from allied nations, clearly signaling the alliance’s demands for space capabilities so companies can scale to meet them, and streamlining procurement rules while balancing security needs in the face of rapid commercial innovation. The payoff for integrating space commerce into space security is a stronger wall against adversaries, according to commentary from July 2024 by the Washington-based think tank the Center for Strategic and International Studies. Citing NATO’s APSS initiative, author and senior fellow Benjamin Jensen said, “Even if Moscow finds a way to disrupt NATO member state satellites tracking its advance as it attacks, it will struggle to achieve effects against the myriad commercial satellites in multiple orbits. In other words, the future of collective defense in space rests on developing standards for integrating the private sector and sharing data.”
The APSS initiative represents a strengthening of NATO’s relationship with industry, said Patten, a Canadian space engineer and head of technology, adoption and resilience with NCIA. “We have established a frame contract for APSS with around 50 companies,” she said. “We will remain forward thinking by closely collaborating with industry, learning alongside them as they advance. … The capabilities emerging from industry are impressive and we should capitalize on the innovations they are developing.” Planet Labs, a satellite imaging company based in San Francisco, announced in August 2024 that it had signed a contract to provide NCIA with high-resolution data through the company’s SkySat, a constellation of 21 satellites that can revisit any location on Earth up to 10 times a day.
NATO will also rely on space companies for a top challenge it faces in the domain: processing and analyzing data. “That means the use of artificial intelligence, machine learning and other technologies to process the massive influx of data, transform it into actionable insights and optimize the precious time of the analyst,” Patten said. “Machine learning or AI will be a key success factor for APSS.” NATO issued a revised AI policy in July 2024, seeking to position itself as “a platform between Allies to facilitate information exchange and sharing of good practice.”
Luxembourg was the trailblazing nation funding the establishment of APSS and driving the vision forward. The nation’s cash contribution will pay for gathering an expert team to start work on the integration of systems and data, according to NATO’s APSS fact sheet. Each nation, together with NATO, will determine how best it can contribute to the initiative, with several pledging already to provide funding as well as data from national and commercial platforms. A 12-member APSS steering group held its third meeting in November 2023 in The Hague, attended by representatives from NATO headquarters, Supreme Headquarters Allied Power Europe, the Luxembourg Ministry of Foreign Affairs and NCIA.
NCIA is responsible for NATO’s systems and services overall, enabling allies — in the words of NCIA General Manager Ludwig Decamps — to talk, work, train and, if necessary, fight. In space, a key service the agency delivers is round-the-clock satellite communications, employing a staff of 160, a satellite center in Kester, Belgium, and seven ground stations. Four of the ground stations — in Belgium, Greece, Italy and Türkiye — underwent a major upgrade in 2023, nearly doubling satellite communications ground coverage and enabling NATO to do more with fewer stations, NCIA said in a June 2024 news release.
APSS and the Aquila constellation will change how NATO collects, exploits and disseminates intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance (ISR) information from space. It’s more adaptation than reinvention, Patten said, and it may someday put the alliance back in the satellite game. “NATO has been doing intelligence since its inception. Those systems have been continuously adapted and upgraded and we add APSS as an additional sensor system for that existing intelligence enterprise.” She added, “Now, we also have a forum for consultation between the nations on ISR from space — expertise-sharing between nations, and potentially, in the future, a collective development of space assets or services.”