“Trump Considers Firing Air Force Chief Over Space Force Pushback” (Foreign Policy 10/4/18) https://foreignpolicy.com/2018/10/04/trump-considers-ousting-air-force-head-over-space-force-pushback/ President Trump is peeved with Heather Wilson over her handling of his directive to stand up a separate Space Force in the U.S. military, and he’s considering ousting her after the midterm elections, three sources with knowledge of the matter told Foreign Policy. Wilson recently angered Trump as well as Deputy Defense Secretary Patrick Shanahan, Defense Secretary James Mattis’s second in command, with what is seen as a campaign to undermine the Space Force effort, the sources said.
Donald Trump has officially ordered the creation of Space Command at the Pentagon – the first step on the way to a US Space Force – an organization that could cost around $800 million over the next five years. https://www.independent.co.uk/news/science/space-command-us-force-trump-military-memorandum-a8689721.html “A new era of American national security in space begins today,” Vice President Mike Pence said on Tuesday at the Kennedy Space Center in Florida.
A Senate panel on Thursday raised a long list of reservations to a Trump administration plan to create Space Force as a new military branch that could require $500 million in annual funding. https://warisboring.com/space-force-faces-senate-panels-skepticism-concerns/ Among Rhode Island Sen. Jack Reed, the committee’s ranking Democrat’s concerns, Space Force would see the military’s highest ratio of headquarters personnel to its overall servicemember population. For example, the Air Force has an estimated 320,000 airmen to its 2,300 headquarters personnel, while the Space Force ratio would be 16,500 to 1,000, he said.
A key House panel has rejected the Trump administration’s plan to create Space Force, a sixth branch of the U.S. military focused on orbital operations. https://www.defenseone.com/politics/2019/05/house-panel-rejects-space-force/157139/ The proposal “leaves many unanswered questions and lacks important details and supporting analysis to justify the proposed size, scope, cost, roles, and authorities for the new military service,” members of the Democrat-led House Appropriations Committee’s defense subcommittee said in their report on the 2020 budget proposal. https://docs.house.gov/meetings/AP/AP00/20190521/109534/HMKP-116-AP00-20190521-SD002.pdf
That markup reflects the subcommittee’s decisions last week to: Approve $15 million “to study and refine plans for the potential establishment of a Space Force”; Reject the Pentagon’s $72.4 million proposal to put together a Space Force headquarters staff at the Pentagon in fiscal 2020 and Approve $70 million to fund U.S. Space Command, the new combatant command for space warfighting.
The full House Appropriations Committee is scheduled to review the defense budget on Tuesday.
The force only has one member so far, Jay Raymond, a general and commander of the newly created branch of the military. Some active duty airmen currently in the Air Force’s already-existing Space Command will be assigned to the new branch but will remain in the Air Force for the time being, officials have said and 5,000 to 6,000 personnel out of the current 16,000 will eventually be transferred to the Space Force, according to a senior US Air Force official.
The Trump administration has allocated $40 million to fund the force in its first year.
United States Space Force @SpaceForceDoD 5:52 PM · Jan 17, 2020:
The first #SpaceForce utility uniform nametapes have touched down in the Pentagon.
“President Donald Trump unveiled the new US Space Force logo on Friday — which seems to boldly go where one logo has gone before.
Trump posted an image on Twitter of the insignia for the newest branch of the US military, drawing immediate comparisons of the new logo to the “Star Trek” Starfleet Starship duty insignia. The logo is also similar to the insignia of the Air Force Space Command, which was the precursor to the Space Force, hosting 16,000 active duty airmen and civilians.
“After consultation with our Great Military Leaders, designers, and others, I am pleased to present the new logo for the United States Space Force, the Sixth Branch of our Magnificent Military!” the 45th President tweeted.”
Maj. William Russell, a separate Space Force spokesperson, said Trump was the one who chose the new logo from a series of options presented by the Department of the Air Force.
In December, when Trump signed the National Defense Authorization Act into law, Gen. John Raymond, the previous commander of US Space Command and Air Force Space Command, told reporters “it’s going to be really important that we get this right. A uniform, a patch, a song, it gets to the culture of a service, and so we’re not going to be in a rush to get something and not do that right.” https://www.cnn.com/2020/01/24/politics/space-force-star-trek-logo-donald-trump/index.html
Side by side comparison of the two logos:
The United States Space Force, the newest branch of the US military hewn from the Department of Defense’s space-focused units under instructions from President Donald Trump, has a lot to do in order to establish itself. Among other things, the service’s leadership needs to decide what to call its members and each of its ranks (which, unlike “airman” and “seaman,” needs to be gender neutral). https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2020/02/spacey-mcspaceface-space-force-tries-crowdsourcing-term-for-members/
In a Space Force email posted to an Air Force enlisted group on Facebook, Chief Master Sergeant Amber Mitchell—a senior enlisted leader on the staff of the United States Space Force—reached out to enlisted members of the nascent service for the purpose of “crowdsourcing your best ideas” on a number of topics essential to establishing the force’s identity. See https://www.facebook.com/AirForceForum/posts/1484514338388868?__tn__=-R
“Netflix must be feeling pretty good about Space Force, its forthcoming sci-fi comedy series starring Steve Carell (The Office), because it just released an entertaining second trailer, with over three minutes of mostly new footage.” https://arstechnica.com/gaming/2020/05/failure-is-not-an-option-in-latest-space-force-trailer/ The cast also includes John Malkovich (The New Pope), Ben Schwartz (Jean-Ralphio from Parks and Recreation), Jimmy O. Yang (Silicon Valley, Crazy Rich Asians), Noah Emmerich (The Americans), Lisa Kudrow (Friends), and Jane Lynch (Glee, Marvelous Mrs. Maisel), among others.
“Space Force unveils recruiting video featuring secret space vehicle that will launch this month” (Stars & Stripes 5/6/20) https://www.stripes.com/news/space-force/space-force-unveils-recruiting-video-featuring-secret-space-vehicle-that-will-launch-this-month-1.628669
“After previewing the commercial, [Air Force Secretary Barbara] Barrett pointed out the inclusion of the secretive X-37B Orbital Test Vehicle, an Air Force-owned, unmanned space craft that looks like a small version of a space shuttle.
The vehicle will be launched by the Space Force in Florida from Cape Canaveral Air Force Base, which will transition at some point to Cape Canaveral Space Force Base. It will mark the sixth mission into space for the X-37B, but the first conducted by the Space Force, which will be responsible for the vehicle’s launch, its operations in orbit and its landing.
It will conduct a variety of missions, including five unspecified Air Force experiments, a test by the U.S. Naval Research Laboratory on transforming solar power into radio frequency microwave energy, and two NASA experiments on space’s effects on certain materials and seeds, according to the Air Force.”
See also Advanced Extremely High Frequency communications satellites https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Advanced_Extremely_High_Frequency and Hall-effect thrusters https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hall-effect_thruster
(Dec 22, 2020): “The massive $2.3 trillion appropriations package Congress passed for fiscal year 2021 provides $696 billion for the Defense Department, including $15.2 billion for the U.S. Space Force.
Space Force funding includes $2.4 billion for operations and maintenance, $2.3 billion for procurement and $10.5 billion for RDT&E.
Compared to the Pentagon’s budget request, Congress slightly reduced Space Force procurement from $2.4 billion to $2.3 billion but increased RDT&E from $10.3 billion to $10.5 billion.
Congress also added $15 million for “tactically responsive launch,” a program for which the Pentagon did not request any money.” https://spacenews.com/omnibus-spending-bill-gives-space-force-its-first-separate-budget/
(Sept 12, 2020): “The $22 million for Tactically Responsive Space Launch was added to the Air Force’s Research, Development, Test and Evaluation (RDT&E) account. “The committee believes that demonstrating tactically responsive launch operations that leverage new and innovative commercial capabilities will enable Department of Defense space domain mission assurance and strategic deterrence objectives,” said the committee’s draft report accompanying the markup.
Appropriators noted that a “coherent tactically responsive launch concept of operations is needed to address tactics, techniques, and procedures and support operationally relevant satellite reconstitution demonstrations and pilot programs.” https://spacenews.com/senate-appropriators-add-22m-for-small-launch-approve-72m-space-force-request/
“Financial Management. Research and Development Funding. Research Development Test & Evaluation (RDT&E) funding is used to pay the operating costs of dedicated activities engaged in the conduct of research, development, and test and evaluation efforts performed by a contractor and/or government organization.” https://acqnotes.com/acqnote/careerfields/research-and-development-funding
“After Math: Space Farce” https://www.engadget.com/2018/08/12/after-math-space-farce/ Numbers, because how else could you fully appreciate this $3 trillion boondoggle?
“Trump signs defense bill creating Space Force” https://thehill.com/policy/defense/475505-trump-signs-defense-bill-creating-space-force In a win for Trump, the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) establishes Space Force as the sixth branch of the U.S. military, with a goal of protecting U.S. assets in space from threats from Russia and China. The new service will be part of the Department of the Air Force in a structure similar to the Marine Corps relationship to the Navy and will be led by a four-star chief of space operations.
Meanwhile:
“DHS Was Finally Getting Serious About Cybersecurity. Then Came Trump.” https://www.politico.com/news/magazine/2019/12/18/america-cybersecurity-homeland-security-trump-nielsen-070149
“High-profile departures widen federal government’s security talent shortage : Recent key departures–voluntary and forced–might make it harder for government agencies to find the talent needed to fulfill their security missions.” https://www.csoonline.com/article/3509968/high-profile-departures-widen-federal-governments-security-talent-shortage.html
“Donald Trump’s Space Force Is a Scam : Or, worse, a call for war” https://warisboring.com/donald-trumps-space-force-is-a-scam/
“Trump Considers Firing Air Force Chief Over Space Force Pushback” (Foreign Policy 10/4/18) https://foreignpolicy.com/2018/10/04/trump-considers-ousting-air-force-head-over-space-force-pushback/ President Trump is peeved with Heather Wilson over her handling of his directive to stand up a separate Space Force in the U.S. military, and he’s considering ousting her after the midterm elections, three sources with knowledge of the matter told Foreign Policy. Wilson recently angered Trump as well as Deputy Defense Secretary Patrick Shanahan, Defense Secretary James Mattis’s second in command, with what is seen as a campaign to undermine the Space Force effort, the sources said.
Donald Trump has officially ordered the creation of Space Command at the Pentagon – the first step on the way to a US Space Force – an organization that could cost around $800 million over the next five years. https://www.independent.co.uk/news/science/space-command-us-force-trump-military-memorandum-a8689721.html “A new era of American national security in space begins today,” Vice President Mike Pence said on Tuesday at the Kennedy Space Center in Florida.
A Senate panel on Thursday raised a long list of reservations to a Trump administration plan to create Space Force as a new military branch that could require $500 million in annual funding. https://warisboring.com/space-force-faces-senate-panels-skepticism-concerns/ Among Rhode Island Sen. Jack Reed, the committee’s ranking Democrat’s concerns, Space Force would see the military’s highest ratio of headquarters personnel to its overall servicemember population. For example, the Air Force has an estimated 320,000 airmen to its 2,300 headquarters personnel, while the Space Force ratio would be 16,500 to 1,000, he said.
A key House panel has rejected the Trump administration’s plan to create Space Force, a sixth branch of the U.S. military focused on orbital operations. https://www.defenseone.com/politics/2019/05/house-panel-rejects-space-force/157139/ The proposal “leaves many unanswered questions and lacks important details and supporting analysis to justify the proposed size, scope, cost, roles, and authorities for the new military service,” members of the Democrat-led House Appropriations Committee’s defense subcommittee said in their report on the 2020 budget proposal. https://docs.house.gov/meetings/AP/AP00/20190521/109534/HMKP-116-AP00-20190521-SD002.pdf
That markup reflects the subcommittee’s decisions last week to: Approve $15 million “to study and refine plans for the potential establishment of a Space Force”; Reject the Pentagon’s $72.4 million proposal to put together a Space Force headquarters staff at the Pentagon in fiscal 2020 and Approve $70 million to fund U.S. Space Command, the new combatant command for space warfighting.
The full House Appropriations Committee is scheduled to review the defense budget on Tuesday.
Congress set to approve Space Force next month, hold up centers around name and which state gets the headquarters. https://www.npr.org/2019/08/11/743612373/with-congressional-blessing-space-force-is-closer-to-launch The Trump administration has requested $14.1 billion to fund military space endeavors next year, including new GPS technology, space launch systems and personnel supports.
“Congress, White House near deal to create Space Force in exchange for paid leave for federal workers : Approval would come as part of defense authorization bill in Congress” https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/2019/12/06/congress-white-house-near-deal-create-space-force-exchange-paid-leave-federal-workers/
“Donald Trump may get his space force – in deal for federal paid parental leave : Military and civilian workers could get 12 weeks of paid leave / Ivanka Trump hails ‘HUGE’ step but deal not yet done” https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2019/dec/07/donald-trump-space-force-deal-federal-workers-paid-parental-leave
The force only has one member so far, Jay Raymond, a general and commander of the newly created branch of the military. Some active duty airmen currently in the Air Force’s already-existing Space Command will be assigned to the new branch but will remain in the Air Force for the time being, officials have said and 5,000 to 6,000 personnel out of the current 16,000 will eventually be transferred to the Space Force, according to a senior US Air Force official.
The Trump administration has allocated $40 million to fund the force in its first year.
United States Space Force @SpaceForceDoD 5:52 PM · Jan 17, 2020:
The first #SpaceForce utility uniform nametapes have touched down in the Pentagon.
“President Donald Trump unveiled the new US Space Force logo on Friday — which seems to boldly go where one logo has gone before.
Trump posted an image on Twitter of the insignia for the newest branch of the US military, drawing immediate comparisons of the new logo to the “Star Trek” Starfleet Starship duty insignia. The logo is also similar to the insignia of the Air Force Space Command, which was the precursor to the Space Force, hosting 16,000 active duty airmen and civilians.
“After consultation with our Great Military Leaders, designers, and others, I am pleased to present the new logo for the United States Space Force, the Sixth Branch of our Magnificent Military!” the 45th President tweeted.”
Maj. William Russell, a separate Space Force spokesperson, said Trump was the one who chose the new logo from a series of options presented by the Department of the Air Force.
In December, when Trump signed the National Defense Authorization Act into law, Gen. John Raymond, the previous commander of US Space Command and Air Force Space Command, told reporters “it’s going to be really important that we get this right. A uniform, a patch, a song, it gets to the culture of a service, and so we’re not going to be in a rush to get something and not do that right.” https://www.cnn.com/2020/01/24/politics/space-force-star-trek-logo-donald-trump/index.html
Side by side comparison of the two logos:
The United States Space Force, the newest branch of the US military hewn from the Department of Defense’s space-focused units under instructions from President Donald Trump, has a lot to do in order to establish itself. Among other things, the service’s leadership needs to decide what to call its members and each of its ranks (which, unlike “airman” and “seaman,” needs to be gender neutral). https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2020/02/spacey-mcspaceface-space-force-tries-crowdsourcing-term-for-members/
In a Space Force email posted to an Air Force enlisted group on Facebook, Chief Master Sergeant Amber Mitchell—a senior enlisted leader on the staff of the United States Space Force—reached out to enlisted members of the nascent service for the purpose of “crowdsourcing your best ideas” on a number of topics essential to establishing the force’s identity. See https://www.facebook.com/AirForceForum/posts/1484514338388868?__tn__=-R
Artifactual: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-bWLUMP8r5I&feature=emb_logo
“The U.S. military has released its first commercial for the Space Force to attract what will be its first recruits as the service evolves into the military’s newest branch.” (Washington Examiner 5/7/20) https://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2020/may/7/first-us-space-force-commercial-released-maybe-you/
Steve Carell’s Space Force Is The Military Documentary We Desperately Need Right Now
Carell and the showrunner of The Office have created a workplace comedy that may end up being a bit closer to reality than not. https://www.thedrive.com/the-war-zone/33312/steve-carells-space-force-is-the-military-documentary-we-desperately-need-right-now
“Netflix must be feeling pretty good about Space Force, its forthcoming sci-fi comedy series starring Steve Carell (The Office), because it just released an entertaining second trailer, with over three minutes of mostly new footage.” https://arstechnica.com/gaming/2020/05/failure-is-not-an-option-in-latest-space-force-trailer/ The cast also includes John Malkovich (The New Pope), Ben Schwartz (Jean-Ralphio from Parks and Recreation), Jimmy O. Yang (Silicon Valley, Crazy Rich Asians), Noah Emmerich (The Americans), Lisa Kudrow (Friends), and Jane Lynch (Glee, Marvelous Mrs. Maisel), among others.
“Space Force unveils recruiting video featuring secret space vehicle that will launch this month” (Stars & Stripes 5/6/20) https://www.stripes.com/news/space-force/space-force-unveils-recruiting-video-featuring-secret-space-vehicle-that-will-launch-this-month-1.628669
“After previewing the commercial, [Air Force Secretary Barbara] Barrett pointed out the inclusion of the secretive X-37B Orbital Test Vehicle, an Air Force-owned, unmanned space craft that looks like a small version of a space shuttle.
The vehicle will be launched by the Space Force in Florida from Cape Canaveral Air Force Base, which will transition at some point to Cape Canaveral Space Force Base. It will mark the sixth mission into space for the X-37B, but the first conducted by the Space Force, which will be responsible for the vehicle’s launch, its operations in orbit and its landing.
It will conduct a variety of missions, including five unspecified Air Force experiments, a test by the U.S. Naval Research Laboratory on transforming solar power into radio frequency microwave energy, and two NASA experiments on space’s effects on certain materials and seeds, according to the Air Force.”
See also Advanced Extremely High Frequency communications satellites https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Advanced_Extremely_High_Frequency and Hall-effect thrusters https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hall-effect_thruster
“The newest branch of the military announced Friday in a series of tweets that Space Force members will henceforth be known as “guardians.” Vice President Mike Pence officially announced the new name, according to The Associated Press.” https://www.huffpost.com/entry/space-force-guardians-twitter-snark_n_5fdd2e35c5b6a7df666476d0
https://pbs.twimg.com/media/EpjPgvfXIAUQMgp?format=jpg&name=small
(Dec 22, 2020): “The massive $2.3 trillion appropriations package Congress passed for fiscal year 2021 provides $696 billion for the Defense Department, including $15.2 billion for the U.S. Space Force.
Space Force funding includes $2.4 billion for operations and maintenance, $2.3 billion for procurement and $10.5 billion for RDT&E.
Compared to the Pentagon’s budget request, Congress slightly reduced Space Force procurement from $2.4 billion to $2.3 billion but increased RDT&E from $10.3 billion to $10.5 billion.
Congress also added $15 million for “tactically responsive launch,” a program for which the Pentagon did not request any money.” https://spacenews.com/omnibus-spending-bill-gives-space-force-its-first-separate-budget/
(Sept 12, 2020): “The $22 million for Tactically Responsive Space Launch was added to the Air Force’s Research, Development, Test and Evaluation (RDT&E) account. “The committee believes that demonstrating tactically responsive launch operations that leverage new and innovative commercial capabilities will enable Department of Defense space domain mission assurance and strategic deterrence objectives,” said the committee’s draft report accompanying the markup.
Appropriators noted that a “coherent tactically responsive launch concept of operations is needed to address tactics, techniques, and procedures and support operationally relevant satellite reconstitution demonstrations and pilot programs.” https://spacenews.com/senate-appropriators-add-22m-for-small-launch-approve-72m-space-force-request/
“Financial Management. Research and Development Funding. Research Development Test & Evaluation (RDT&E) funding is used to pay the operating costs of dedicated activities engaged in the conduct of research, development, and test and evaluation efforts performed by a contractor and/or government organization.” https://acqnotes.com/acqnote/careerfields/research-and-development-funding
“Politics and the English Language” George Orwell (1946) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Politics_and_the_English_Language