The Ministry of Defence say that a special ceremony held at Space Command Headquarters, RAF High Wycombe yesterday marked the official opening of UK Space Command, with the first ‘Space Operator’ Badges presented to personnel.

A statement from the MoD reads:

“Space plays a vital role in the Armed Forces ability to undertake the majority of defence tasks, with any disruption to the space domain leading to significant consequences on civilian, commercial, economic and military activity.

The stand-up of Space Command is a crucial step to ensure we protect UK interests in space and builds on the commitments outlined in the Defence Command Paper, to invest an additional £1.4 billion on space over the next 10 years.

The ability to operate in Space is further enhanced by an increase in Defence funding of £24 billion over the next four years, as announced by the Prime Minister last year.”

Minister for Defence Procurement Jeremy Quin said:

“As our adversaries advance their space capabilities, it is vital we invest in space to ensure we maintain a battle-winning advantage across this fast-evolving operational domain. The stand-up of Space Command is an exciting and important step in our commitment to operate in space effectively.”

Commander of UK Space Command Air Vice Marshal Paul Godfrey said:

“The space domain is vital, not just in enabling military operations across the world, but in the day to day lives of everyone across the nation. With our new headquarters officially open, UK Space Command is now on the path to lead UK space operations to protect UK and allied interests in space.”

When at full operating capability, UK Space Command will provide command and control of all of Defence’s space capabilities, including the UK’s Space Operations Centre, RAF Fylingdales, SKYNET and other enabling capabilities.

Under the leadership of Air Vice Marshal Paul Godfrey, the Joint Command will have oversight of all space capability development in the Ministry of Defence across three main areas:

  • Space operations
  • Space workforce training and growth
  • Space capability to develop and deliver space equipment programmes

You can read more here.

George Allison
George Allison
George has a degree in Cyber Security from Glasgow Caledonian University and has a keen interest in naval and cyber security matters and has appeared on national radio and television to discuss current events. George is on Twitter at @geoallison
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86 COMMENTS

    • The RAF is very good at ‘office politics’, so I am not surprised that they have managed to gain 651 posts from the army – and without a lot of fuss or adverse publicity. They have taken over a number of former army posts in Cyprus over the years. They made a pitch to fly and operate Apache before that type’s entry into service, claiming the army would be hopeless at so doing.

      I am sure that Space Command is secretly an RAF idea, to get more senior officer appointments for ‘the light blue’ even though it is a tri-service command.
      Really, why do we need it – we managed to run space operations perfectly well previously, and with a low beauraucracy/overhead.

      …and those badges are very Star Trek!

      • Army ‘Be the best’ Navy ‘See the world’ RAF ‘It’s better than working for a living’ I know cheap joke but i’m a very cheap man !

  4. I’d argue the UK needs a sovereign equatorial launch complex for low inclination orbits.

    Not necessarily a military one mind you.

      • What about a converted oil rig of the sort Space X are intending. If they can do it with the biggest rocket in history I presume the launchers we will be using would be relatively straight forward by comparison. Allows flexibility of launch site too, even if it were based at Ascension or similar base most of the time.

        • That would seem to me to make a lot of sense. SpaceX paid $3.5 million each for the two oil rigs that it bought (and I am pretty sure they were rigs rather than platforms, in my experience people in the oil industry get irritated when outsiders mix up the two). Admittedly there is presumably substantial additional cost to convert them but there are also costs of building a land-based launch facility that need to be offset against that and I suspect that things like flame diverters and deluge systems would be far easier to implement on a sea-based facility vs on land (a flame diverter might not be necessary at all if the rocket sits on top of an opening down to the sea; not sure if that would also obviate the need for a deluge system).

          If they went that route might either Ascension or Diego-Garcia be possibilities for the land-based support? DG is very slightly closer to the equator, 505.73 miles vs 548.72 miles based on my internet lookups. That doesn’t really matter that much since I assume the sea launch facility itself would be located somewhere near the limit of controlled waters in the direction of the equator so journey time when personnel need to go out to ready for a launch or do maintenance at other times, or to chase off any unwanted visitors, would be the same and a 50 mile difference in distance to the equator is neither here nor there but maybe more critically how does the weather compare between the two locations? (I’m assuming here that whatever lease agreement we have with the USA re DG would allow us the flexibility to undertake such a project there.)

      • Dan,
        In answer to your question, yes as the real estate down there is quite large . However and a big however is the jetty would have to have a lot of money spent on it in which to make it capable of dealing with a lot of sea delivered equipment

        • I also imagine that since Ascension is quite remote, even if the jetty is upgraded, it’ll still be very expensive to launch from there?

          • There is that that, but as Ascension is just off the equator, the costs to launch into space are vastly reduced. Its why Europe’s Spaceport is situated in the northeast of South America in French Guiana,

          • Yeah but French Guiana is a considerably larger territory with considerable traffic going there anyway, Ascension Island would require pretty bespoke shipping solutions I imagine.

            Then again I could be wrong and the logistics cost might be offset by equatorial launches. For a purely military site I think Ascension would be a no brainer, but I think the UK needs to have a mixed military/civilian launch complex or we risk boom/bust cycles like in shipbuilding.

        • Morning Farouk! from the Horses mouth info!! Ascension also has the distinction of probably the largest per capita rate of shark attacks in the world including a couple of Brit defence personnel!

          • It’s one of the main areas where Hammerheads go to breed. There are also a few other types of shark that go there for breeding.

      • Morning Daniele. Plenty room-only 800 people on the island, no indigenous pop. About 200 US and UK military and admin personnel and the balance about 600 St Helenians who run the rest of the private and civil service stuff including a small Police detatchment. i think it would be ideal. The Yanks are in the process of repairing what is one of the worlds longest runways so all good! 😀 
        11 degrees in early morning Durban warming to 20’s later
        Cheers
        Geoff

        • Morning geoff.

          17 here. We’ve not had much of a summer so far!

          Ascension is a feather in our cap, like the other PJOBs.

    • Or have a look into whether we can go the Virgin Orbital/Galactic route and launch from a plane flown to the equator.
      I can imagine many benefits to a launch site that can pick its own weather conditions.

      • The issue with a aircraft launched rocket is that it severely limits your payload. Virgins Launcher 1 can just about get 500kg into LEO, compare with a Falcon 9 that can get around 22t.

  7. Curious as to the. Numbers of people in Space Command seeing as they’re headed up by an AVM, I’m sure he’ll need a couple of 4 ringers, half a dozen 3 ringers etc…

    Maybe not too man Indians but plenty Chiefs.

  10. As far as I am aware, we don’t even have the capability to shoot enemy satalleites down. Its a bit like having an air force without planes.

    • Mind you the US airforce in the 1st WW didn’t have any planes and only got some eventually from the French who gave them their cast off Nieuports which were renown for tearing off their wing canvas in a dive. Let’s hope that doesn’t happen in Space.

    • It has to be given a chance.

      The RAF has been in the space game for decades, but not offensive assets.
      At the moment it’s ground based assets, and apparently Skynet will be brought in house. Over the decade small sats will be added.

      Yew, we have no ASAT weapons.

        • Exactly.

          Not sure if anyone has a Proven capability. The US ASAT missile of the cold war, I think that’s gone.

          I think the Soviets had killer sats? Or was that too much of Red Storm Rising?

          • well Israel’s apparently David’s sling or arrow 3 have anti-satellite capabilities to a certain degree. maybe we could borrow a few batteries until we get our own?

        • Russia, China and India have destroyed satellites in the last 5 years. When India did it last they f***ed up, as they hadn’t properly calculated the extent of the debris field. It was touch and go whether it would hit other satellites. The USA had a dedicated anti-satellite missile back in the 80’s launched by F15s, but it hasn’t been maintained. Both THAAD (LEO) and SM3 have anti-satellite capabilities, with SM3 having been used to take out an obsolete one fairly recently. I don’t think SM3 can attack the high orbiting satellites though.

          Technically both the UK and France along with Pakistan and North Korea have the capability, as they have ballistic missiles that carry nuclear warheads. Israel has nukes as well, but I don’t believe they are ballistic missile launched, only cruise missile and free fall. But if any of them did use one, they’d take out everyone’s satellites within the blast radius.

          • The blast radius isn’t the issue, it is the debris field that would spread and potentially domino, taking out an entire orbital corridor ala the movie Gravity.

            Just what we need – space battles that end up denying entire orbital layers for decades or even hundreds of years into the future 🙁

          • I was referring to the nuke’s EMP radius rather than the debris field, I should have explained that better. But you are quite correct the debris field will be a major long term hazard.

            Satellites have varying strengths of EMI shielding. The upper high altitude ones having the most. Setting a nuke off in low to medium Earth orbit will be catastrophic, as the EMP will overwhelm their protection. Further, the EMP should have a greater immediate effect over a wide area, whilst the debris thrown out will take time to reach satellites in their various altitudes. The debris will have a longer term effect though, as it hits more and more satellites by it expansion. The spinning magnetic field and gravity will cause the debris to form into a wave that will rotate in the same direction, destroying or damaging anything in its path, eventually falling to Earth through a decaying orbit.

    • Isn’t space, (like the Arctic and Antarctic) meant to be a non-militarised ‘space’, except for the presence of military sattelites!

  11. Does this mean that school Combined Cadet Forces are going to be allowed to have a Space Cadet section with a Star Trek badge?

    • It’s not a ‘Flying badge’ Steve, although it certainly looks like one. As far as I can tell, holders of this brevet will be mainly ground based and will comprise current Air Traffic Control and Fighter Control personnel, who will be merged into this Air & Space Force. It will be the first time non-aircrew – and junior ranks – will wear such a brevet. If I’m reading it correctly, airmen/women and Junior NCOs will wear the brevet on completion of training.

      There is now also a scheme similar to the non-commissioned aircrew branch, in that someone can join either from civvy street (or from existing serving personnel) and, after training, be promoted directly to Sergeant rank.

      Still, it will brighten up an otherwise uninspiring RAF uniform.

      Cheers!

      • Thanks for the explanation, being old school winged brevet’s are aircrew badges and I’ve still not got over the dropping of the ‘job’ initial in the naughties from the centre of the wreath. 😢

      • Surely AAC junior rank aircrew wear a wings brevet. I think there are still some Cpl aircrew in the AAC?

        • Hi Graham. I was referring to RAF ranks and trades only. Don’t know much about AAC. However, there are junior ranks – Senior Aircraftsmen/women and JNCOs – flying as cabin crew on Voyager aircraft. They wear miniature wings on their uniforms.

          Personally, I think the new trade should wear similar miniature wings, if they really have to. Ground trades wearing the new brevet could very easily be taken as flight crews. Were I still in the RAF I would be a bit miffed to see a ground trade wearing psuedo flying badges as what is actually a trade badge. IMO it would be more appropriate for the new trade to wear miniature wings below their rank badges. I was proud to wear a ‘sparks’ badge below my rank insignia.

          Rant over!

    • Sir that’s a terrible comment. Galaxy Quest is a really fun movie. It’s worth watching for Alan Rickman alone, nevermind Sigourney Weaver hamming it up.

      • Hi Liam, you’ll get no argument from me on Alan Rickman, one of my absolute favourites and Galaxy Quest is a smashing film but the badge? Pffft, wings are for aircrew, birds or angels.

  15. Is ironic when Trump created the US Space Force the media, ect were all laughing at him. They even created a comedy TV series about it. Now other countries like Britain, France, ect are all following him and creating their own dedicated Space Force.

    • It doesn’t mean we are creating a space force because of Trump. It would have happened anyway regardless of party/president in power. And Trump was a total disaster for America.

  16. Whoever wears that is going to come in for a right p..s take. Mind it reminds me of Thunderbirds a bit, and Troy Tempest was well ally.

  18. WTF does a space operator have to do to get given that badge? Sit at a desk watching combat footage of the Battlestar Galactica series? Please excuse my limited space ops knowledge……

    • At a guess, i’d say control satellites and the ops room staff in BMEWS and varied monitoring roles.

      There are 2 SATCOM control sites in the UK. Both run by contractors with some MoD personnel but I’ve read Skynet and its associated ground based infrastructure will be brought back in house. And the sites are still MoD. So maybe if military return to some of those positions ( like the old RAF 1001 SU ) they will wear it.

      NASOC staff, at the bunker at Naphill monitoring the tens of thousands of space debris, with the Duty officer linked to Fylingdales and London ( the 4 minute warning.) Not to be confused with the NADOC, which is the same location, different ops room.

      And the Fylingdales site is also now Space Command so the ops staff there should get it.

      Maybe some in Wyton too, with its links to satellite imagery analysis. ( DIFC )

      Its not going to be, if ever, field based staff or military Astronauts. That is the preseve of the US Space Command.

      Its still in its infancy and hard to piece it all together mate. More will emerge.

      • As ever mate your subject matter knowledge and research knows no limits! Thanks, I did think there would be a few at Wyton and people who monitor air space etc and a number of head sheds, but don’t know enough of the systems and chain of events, links and locations to even guess who else would be sewing it on! Cheers mate. The RAF and the RN are really making the Army look out of date and more and more irrelevant recently. Both services are planning and grasping the future where the Army is continuing to go around in circles and literary re-inventing the bloody wheel every couple of years.

        • Just an educated guess mate. Might well be wrong.

          To expand re locations regards Skynet.

          SATCOM Telemetry and Command Station is at MoD Oakanger. There’s also a small sub site there for NATO SATCOM as well as another SGS.

          Main SGS is now at Colerne, in the middle of the airfield south of the army barracks

          The other at Defford closed.

          Network and Spacecraft Operations Centre is at Skynet Drive, Hawthorn site, Corsham, using the old CDCN bunker ( and quarry workings below )

          Abroad Episkopi has a SGS and I think MP in Falklands has one, unsure.

          Army is in a dreadful mess. Hope the Autumn brings clarity.

        • I share your alarm at the Army being out of shape, in almost every way, for future operations.
          Where are the talented visionarys, the Combat Development, the O&D (Organisation & Development), the Doctrine guys, the Requirements and Procurement staff – who can shake this up?

  19. I wonder if joining members will be known as space cadets? When I was in the Air Training Corps in the 1970’s we were jokingly called space cadets.

    Maybe someone back then knew more than they were letting on …

  22. The Sutherland Space Port could be in doubt??? after the UK Space Agency reported that Lockheed Martin is transferring its satellite launch operations to Unst, Shetland Space Centre (SSC) which was recently renamed as SaxaVord Spaceport where a plan to build a centre at the most Northern tip of Unst, Shetlands most northerly Island.
    See –
    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shetland_Space_Centre
    and the SSC/SVS (shetlandspacecentre) website especially Latest News.
    and I suggest reading and searching Scottish space through the orbitaltoday website.

    According to the UKSA / LaunchUK –
    …To help grow the UK’s spaceflight capabilities, government is funding a range of industry-led projects including:

    £31.5m to help establish vertical launch services from Scotland comprising: £2.5 million to Highlands and Islands Enterprise (HIE) to develop Space Hub Sutherland; £5.5 million to Orbex to build a new rocket for launch from Sutherland; and £23.5 million in two separate grants to Lockheed Martin to establish launch operations at Saxa Vord Spaceport and to build an orbital manoeuvring vehicle in Reading which will launch on Lockheed Martin’s pathfinder launch.
    £7.35m as part of £20m central and local government funding to support horizontal launch by Virgin Orbit from Spaceport Cornwall;
    Up to £1.3m to develop business plans for small satellite launch and sub-orbital flight from airports in Machrihanish, Snowdonia and Cornwall.
    Separately, we are also investing in related facilities and technology, including £99 million for a new National Satellite Test Facility in Harwell and and £60 million to develop a revolutionary hybrid air-breathing rocket engine…

    So £23.5 million for SVS.

  23. Does anyone else think/worry that with all the development going on and plans to travel to space that the vehicles created will end up making all the current 6th gen fighters and bombers almost redundant? China are going strong in this area, and the west will have to match or be left behind and vulnerable.
    I see a space race hotting up in the years to come, both commercially and militarily. The vehicles created will be extremely high mach and be able to conduct strikes around the world in mere 10s of minutes. All of our funding budget for the next 20 years will go on tempest. Whilst I am a supporter of this project, I do wonder if we should be ploughing more money into the Sabre engine and designing potential vehicle options that build on its capabilities instead? This way we focus on the real next gen stuff and get both a military and commercial edge for the future, and just buy off the shelf for the standard tactical fighters for now.

    • No, not really. The reasons are the constraints and requirements needed to reach orbit. If you look at the Skylon single stage to orbit concept. It is far larger than the late Space Shuttle. The specifications as shown on wiki, say it would be over 80m long, the Space Shuttle was close to 55m, whilst Tempest will probably be nearer 20m long. The reason for its huge size is that it uses liquid hydrogen stored at low pressure as the fuel, which has a much lower density than AVTAR for example. This was a design choice, rather than using a hydrocarbon based fuel. Some of the reasons why they chose hydrogen is that it is a eco fuel, i.e. produces water when “burnt” with oxygen. But also in its cryogenic state, it can be used to cool down the liquid helium used to cool the air passing through the pre-cooler.

      To reach orbit you need lots and lots of fuel, which has to be housed somewhere. The majority of the Skylon’s fuselage contains two huge liquid hydrogen tanks. It would be better suited as a missile carrying bomber come reconnaissance aircraft. Although it could be used as a long range fighter, remaining in low earth orbit firing off missiles at targets as they came into range. However, because of its elongated size, it has a much lower coefficient of drag than the Space Shuttle, therefore its thermal protection for re-entering the atmosphere can be lighter, thereby saving weight.

      In Skylon they are proposing to use an airgap spaced metal-ceramic matrix skin over a titanium based inner skin, with some hardier materials on the nose and wing leading edges. This is great for thermal management. But because the ceramic is based on aluminium and silicon-carbide, it is also a great radar reflector, meaning it will be easy to track. Reaction Engines have said that Skylon in rocket mode should be able to travel at Mach 25, which would seem to be unstoppable. But the aircraft will not have great manoeuvrability whilst in orbit or slowing down to re-enter the atmosphere. This means its track will be quite predicable and therefore countermeasures can be employed in its path. For example the SR71 flew at near Mach 3.5 when transiting near a target of interest. The SAM systems of the day could track it but not work out an interception. If the SR71 flew today on a similar flight path a system such as the S400 would kill it. The S400 has both the tracking software and missiles that could intercept the SR71.

      A hypersonic aircraft (manned and unmanned) at speeds greater than Mach 5 will face even greater manoeuvrability challenges than the SR71, due to the induced G loading, therefore any manoeuvres will have to be smooth and modest. If a supersonic missile like the Iris-T can do a 60g high rate turn at Mach 3, a hypersonic missile would need to turn at a much lower rate, due to Newtons second Law of Motion (F = M x A). Otherwise the forces acting on the wings and fuselage during a turn or change in pitch will be huge and likely leading to catastrophic structural failure. Unless it is very heavily reinforced, which then makes it a lot heavier and has a serious knock on effect with its range.

      Therefore, we will continue to see manned/umanned fighter endo-atmospheric aircraft travelling at speeds between Mach 1 and 5 for the foreseeable future. That is until physics works out the principles of inertia dampers! But I think you are right, the Sabre engine raises many future military possibilities for both endo-atmospheric and exo-atmospheric operations. As a bomber it could pretty much reach a launch point on a target in less than 4 hours anywhere on the planet. This would give the UK an unprecedented and rapid response to a threat using conventional weapons (the SSBN is still the better option for a nuclear response).

      At present, no other country has an engine comparable with the Sabre, which combines a subsonic, supersonic, hypersonic jet and a closed cycle rocket in one package. This really is a game changer, giving us the possibilities of a single stage to orbit vehicle. But even if you replaced the hydrogen for a hydrocarbon based fuel, it will still need to be massive. The fuels we have available, simply don’t have the calorific value to reduce the amount needed to place an object in low earth orbit.

  25. Ok, I do see the point of a dedicated Space Command, but along with the Cyber Warfare Unit. Do they get their budgets from the existing defence budget or is it separately additional?

    • AFAIK Space Command is within overall MoD budget but dont know if it will have its own TLB.

      National Cyber Force. Ive not seen seen much extra detail since the 1st announcement. I’d like to know that myself as so many of it’s assets are from GCHQ, SIS, and the SS, which are not MoD.

      There are several existing cyber units already within MoD that are purple in nature and assume their budget is from Strat Com.

  26. At the Cheyenne Mountain Complex in Colorado, the former center for the US Space Command and NORAD, apparently there is a door marked “Stargate Command”. Behind the door is a small storage room.

    • Interesting Mike, I hear BAE Systems have pitched a second generation ‘British Star Gate’ to the MOD and have sprayed a build base doorframe kit silver at Warton as a proof of concept.

      This investment is totally at company expense, they want a paltry £100 million of public funding to excavate a cave in Mt Snowdon and install a silver painted double width Buildbase door fame kit.

      They feel confident that they can make £5 billion of additional funding successfully disappear by 2030.

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