Control of Space and Cyberspace

They go on to state that for the U.S. to maintain its military preeminence three missions must be met by the military forces: Global missile defenses; Control of space and cyberspace; and pursuing a two-stage strategy for of transforming conventional forces. In fact, their paper includes a section called “Space and Cyberspace”:

“No system of missile defenses can be fully effective without placing sensors and weapons in space. Although this would appear to be creating a potential new theater of warfare, in fact space has been militarized for the better part of four decades. Weather, communications, navigation and reconnaissance satellites are increasingly essential elements in American military power. Indeed, U.S. armed forces are uniquely dependent upon space. As the 1996 Joint Strategy Review, a precursor to the 1997 Quadrennial Defense Review, concluded, “Space is already inextricably linked to military operations on land, on the sea, and in the air.” The report of the National Defense Panel agreed: “Unrestricted use of space has become a
major strategic interest of the United States.”

The aims of PNAC and, now, the military on maintaining total control over cyber space become apparent when more and more focus is on Cyber attacks, and Panetta’s comment on the “next Pearl Harbor” should be taken seriously:

“In short, the unequivocal supremacy in space enjoyed by the United States today will be increasingly at risk. As Colin Gray and John Sheldon have written, “Space control is not an avoidable issue. It is not an optional extra.” For U.S. armed forces to continue to assert military preeminence, control of space – defined by Space Command as “the ability to assure access to space, freedom of operations within the space medium, and an ability to deny others the use of space” – must be an essential element of our military strategy.