The first shots of the next war will be fired in space. The UK isn't ready
Given the importance of satellite communications and warnings that Russia is planning to put nuclear weapons into orbit, the UK must take space defence more seriously
“Under-prepared”, “under-insured”, “under attack”. This is how Lord Robertson, co-author of the UK Government’s Strategic Defence Review, recently described our situation. The government has promised to raise defence spending by 2027 and added £2.2 billion for this year, while the review talks of “warfighting readiness”.
But the investment is too slow, and money on its own won’t solve the problem. It takes years to build the industrial base, knowledge, skills, and talent pipeline we need. This is true across defence, but it’s even more pronounced in space, which will decide the outcome of the next war.
Modern militaries depend on space. Look at Ukraine. When GPS is degraded, Position, Navigation and Timing (PNT) become less precise or drop off altogether. Drones lose data, artillery units can't operate, and units slow down because they no longer trust their information.
The opposite is also true: when those links hold, the same units move more quickly, coordinate more easily, and make better use of what they have.
One of the UK’s greatest weaknesses lies in its space architecture. A small number of systems carry a disproportionate share of the load, many depending on continuous control from the ground. In a contested environment, those links will be degraded or denied. When that happens, the satellites will still be there, but the system will break down.
Redundancy – having more spacecraft that can take over if one goes wrong – would change that picture. In air and maritime operations, we use a more dispersed system, with smaller and more numerous vehicles. This allows tasks to be shared, rather than concentrated in a few high-value assets. That usually stands up well under strain.
The same is true in space. Knowing what is in orbit is one thing; understanding intent, and being able to act on it in time, is another. Systems that can process sensor data and respond quickly are therefore vital. That means we need systems with greater autonomy, if only because events move too fast for a human operator.
This isn’t yet reflected in how our systems are designed or procured. Much of the current architecture assumes stability that’s unlikely to hold in a contested environment. The result is a gap between the resilience on paper and in reality.
We need more investment – there is reportedly scepticism about defence spending in the Treasury – but we also need a change in how we invest. We need more systems, working together, designed from the outset to keep going through disruption rather than assuming disruption can be avoided.
The systems that tend to hold up best are the ones that spread risk out, adapt quickly and autonomously, and keep working even when parts of them fail.
This won’t happen overnight, but it must happen soon. Space now sits upstream of how all modern forces work and some, like US Space Command’s General Stephen Whiting, are warning Russia is planning to put nuclear weapons into orbit.
The very least we can say is that Russia and others are actively developing systems that can shadow, spy on, and potentially disable Western spacecraft. If space degrades, everything downstream of it does as well. If it holds, then the rest of the force has a fighting chance of holding with it.
Graeme Ritchie is chief executive of space-security firm Shield Space
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