Defense Business Brief: Robotic arms + satellite refueling | Iran war costs | Unmasking shadow fleets…from space

It seems everyone wants to rule the cosmos—or get a spaceplane. But the more satellites militaries launch and rely on, the more they need a good watchdog to protect them. And what’s better than one with a robotic arm that can also refuel?

That’s where the MDA Midnight platform, unveiled at Space Symposium in Colorado this week, comes in. The satellite—which boasts a robotic arm—can get in close to inspect other spacecraft, monitor surroundings, investigate approaching objects, and defend against incoming threats if needed, Holly Johnson, vice president of Canadian-based MDA Space’s robotics and space operations told Defense One. 

Plus, it can refuel other satellites using its arm to keep a safe distance from a satellite that needs refueling while keeping it operational, she said.

The arm connects with a satellite’s refueling interface and “the robotics will compensate for the relative drift rates of those two platforms and refuel the satellite in a seamless manner,” Johnson said.

The company has worked with the Space Development Agency and is selected to join the Missile Defense Agency’s SHIELD program. 

“More countries and more companies are going to space,” Johnson said, “and defense organizations around the world are increasingly relying on the imagery, the data, the information and the communications that satellites provide for their operation.” 

There’s been a push for more information on what objects—including upwards of 10,000 satellites—are in space, what they’re doing, who they belong to, and any potential threats, “but the missing part of space domain awareness was being able to do anything about it,” Johnson said. 

The product release comes after the head of U.S. Space Command expressed concerns about China’s recent satellite refueling experiments; more recently, he stressed the need to be able to move satellites around. 

“My concern is if they develop that, they will have the ability to maneuver for advantage the way the United States has for decades—on the land, at sea, and in the air—used maneuver for our advantage,” Gen. Stephen Whiting told the Senate Armed Services Committee last month. “We need to deliver our own maneuver-warfare capability to make sure that we can leverage the advantages that the joint force has developed over the decades in space, as we have in other domains.”

Welcome

You’ve reached the Defense Business Brief, where we dig into what the Pentagon buys, who they’re buying from, and why. Send along your tips, feedback, and song recommendations to lwilliams@defenseone.com. Check out the Defense Business Brief archive here, and tell your friends to subscribe!

Costs of war. A protracted conflict with Iran could cost up to $20 billion per month, with surge capacity pushing it closer to $30 billion, Wayne Sanders, a senior aerospace and defense analyst with Bloomberg Intelligence, told Defense One. 

• Some costs are built into annual budgets, such as operation and maintenance of platforms, regardless of whether they’re in sustained operations. 
• For example, as the U.S. Navy blockades the Strait of Hormuz, “that continued operation and maintenance budget—there's a certain amount that already exists, whether [ships] are floating right outside in the Persian Gulf, or whether or not they're sitting near Norfolk. They're still going to have a $10 million-a-day carrier fee, if you will,” Sanders said. 
• “But the air wing…the amount of missiles that are being expended, the amount of jet fuel—obviously—begins to start playing a part in this, especially as you expand that time frame. So I think that's more into that $20-25 billion range per month for this period of time.” 
• Plus: There will likely be “very high” intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance costs “because you're looking at 24/7 overflights” and air support. 

Demystifying shadow fleets. The U.S.-Israel war on Iran has resurfaced concerns about GPS jamming and spoofing, which can make accurately tracking ships difficult. So spatial imagery company Vantor is melding its tech with Windward’s maritime analytics platform to put crisp, space-based visuals with an aggregate of vessel tracking data to better identify specific ships and their movements. 

• “It's not enough to use [low or medium resolution] satellites to look at ships, because it doesn't tell you anything. It just tells you, ‘hey, here's something that looks like a tanker,’” Windward CEO Ami Daniel told Defense One. 
• “You need to know who it is, what it has been doing, and what's going to do…And you have probably 10 minutes to make that decision because you might have five ships trying to go down the blockade, and you need to decide now. I think that's the core of a partnership with Vantor” and their visual library. 
• Peter Wilczynski, Vantor’s chief product officer, said the company’s imagery can track vessels over time, while Windward can add context.
• “We have no idea what the actual order of battle, from a military context or perspective is, or the ownership structure, especially in the gray and dark fleet environment,” including vessels that deliberately turn off their AIS data to hide their location.
• Vantor will integrate its persistent monitoring technology with Windward’s analytics to answer the question: “how do you take a picture of a ship and give it a fingerprint? And then that fits really naturally with the biographical history of the ship, who commands it, what its patterns are, what it tends to do—that gives you more of that predictive layer.”