The U.S. Air Force (USAF) plays a significant role in the space industry, historically serving as the Department of Defense's executive agent for space, and developing early military space programs and launch vehicles. Although the U.S. Space Force was established as an independent branch in 2019, the Air Force continues to contribute to space operations, including training personnel, research and development, and maintaining partnerships. The USAF's space-related activities encompass satellite operations, missile warning, communication support, and collaboration with allies to ensure regional stability. Key partners include the U.S. Space Force, other branches of the military, and international allies.
All verified mentions of this organization in source documents.
The upgraded legacy ground control system will support the military M-code secure anti-jam GPS signal that the Air Force plans to deploy in 2020.
The 2019 National Defense Authorization Act directed the House Armed Services strategic forces subcommittee to ask the Air Force Secretary for a plan by 2019-03-01 to acquire persistent weather imagery over Central Command without relying on foreign or legacy NOAA spacecraft.
Congress increased funding for the Air Force to purchase commercial weather data to support commercial weather data acquisition.
In 2019 the Air Force planned to test prototype Energetic Charged Particle (ECP) sensors with goals of awarding production contracts in 2020 and achieving full operational capability in 2023.
In 2015 Air Force Secretary Deborah Lee James required by memo that all new Air Force satellites that had not completed their final design phase include an Energetic Charged Particle sensor.
The U.S. Air Force is augmenting space weather observations and improving space weather forecast models to support military reliance on satellites for communications, intelligence, surveillance, reconnaissance, and geolocation.
Thornberry’s committee passed legislation in 2017 to establish a Space Corps within the Air Force.
The 2018 National Defense Authorization Act directed the deputy secretary of defense to contract with a federally funded research and development center without close ties to the Air Force to develop a plan to establish a separate military department responsible for national security space activities.
Air Force Secretary Heather Wilson projected costs of $13,000,000,000 over five years for both a Department of the Space Force and U.S. Space Command, with about half of that amount attributed to the department.
SpaceX prepared a Falcon 9 launch for 2019-01-08 to place the final batch of Iridium Next satellites into orbit from Vandenberg Air Force Base in California.
The fiscal year 2018 National Defense Authorization Act expanded authorities for the Air Force to pursue rapid prototyping and use Other Transaction Authority contracts.
The Air Force shifted $5,000,000,000 internally and added $7,000,000,000 in the fiscal year 2019 budget to accelerate defendable space.
The Air Force implemented organizational flattening at the Space and Missile Systems Center that removed three layers of bureaucracy.
The Air Force will have the cyber protection technology available for carrier strike groups in 2022, about 18 months sooner than previously planned.
Two years ago the Air Force awarded three contracts to develop prototype PTW-capable modems: $39,000,000 to Raytheon, $38,000,000 to L3, and $33,000,000 to Viasat.
The Air Force Space Enterprise Consortium was established in 2017 and given authorities to kick-start projects with less red tape than traditional Pentagon contracting.
SpaceX launched the U.S. Air Force’s newest GPS satellite on 2018-12-23 on a Falcon 9 rocket.
GPS 3 will be the first GPS satellite to do launch and control checkout with the Air Force’s new ground control system OCX Block 0.
The Air Force has selected SpaceX to launch four additional GPS 3 satellites beyond the 2018-12-23 mission.
In September 2018 the Air Force selected Lockheed Martin to build up to 22 more GPS 3 satellites after reopening the program to competition.