The high ground has always mattered. It’s where we put our places of learning, our houses of worship and our military strongholds.
Today, the high ground is much, much higher.
Satellites have become critical to defense, from monitoring for signs of attack to connecting war fighters and the machines that go with them.
Protecting Vital Lines Of Communication
Because satellites are vital, they are targets for enemy action. That led the United States in 2019 to create the U.S. Space Force.
This new branch of the military has an ambitious goal to make certain that military satellite networks stay online, even as enemies interfere with them, try to hack them or knock them out of the sky.
Due to those actions, that requires something completely new: an integrated enterprise level view of the satellites, the secure networks that connect them and the forces deployed on the ground, sea and air, so that enemy action can be met with immediate reaction.
The challenges are immense as each branch of the U.S. military operates its own part of the communication and surveillance systems.
They also work with private sector companies whose networks and systems need to be included.
Creating this kind of integrated satellite planning and operation system has never even been attempted.
The work is as basic as making certain that every satellite terminal can connect securely to all its assigned satellite networks.
This is also as complex as building an enterprise level platform that can stand up to severe attack and to ensure communications continue to flow.
Protecting Space Assets To Protect the Peace
Development of this new global communications and control platform is the job of Network Innovations U.S. Government.
The platform will connect the broadest range of terminals and satellites and will match up requirements and resources on the fly to keep those connections working, adapting automatically to change, keeping the network secure and protecting it from cyberattacks.
Depending on it will be more than one million active- duty personnel operating from 800 bases, 5,000 aircraft and nearly 500 ships around the world.
By protecting satellite communications, companies such as Network Innovations U.S. Government are also protecting the peace.
When no nation believes it has the ultimate advantage in space, no nation will want to be the first to bring conflict here.
Securing the high ground gives military leaders their best chance to keep it safe for communications, navigation, weather forecasting and the hundred other ways that satellites make a better world.
Produced for SatNews by Space & Satellite Professionals International. See more stories and videos of satellite making a better world at www.bettersatelliteworld.com.