New Zealand is already engaged with the US Space Force in several ways. File photo. Photo: 123rf
The United States is speeding up the integration of partners such as New Zealand into its military space operations, as the US engages in "great power competition" with China.
The Pentagon's power moves in space come with the NATO alliance in crisis, and as China projects naval power in the Tasman Sea with three warships conducting live-fire exercises that disrupted trans-Tasman passenger flights.
New Zealand is already engaged with the US Space Force in several ways, including a fledgling network that the Americans aim to expand to "deliver battlefield intelligence" from commercial satellites "to military commands".
"The New Zealand Defence Force (NZDF) is aware of the Joint Commercial Operations (JCO) mission area expansions, however, the NZDF itself has not expanded its involvement and remains within its remit as approved by Cabinet for JCO," it told RNZ on Monday.
The $50 billion Space Force wing of the US Department of Defence has yet to release its new strategy for international space partnerships, but it has stressed its significance and urgency.
One goal was integrating allies across "every capability, every operation, and every mission", said one commander, Air Marshal Paul Godfrey.
It would set a rapid pace so partners were generating and operating "combat power" within three years.
They would help develop new technologies within two to seven years, probably in part through a 10-nation group which New Zealand is part of.
The defence minister has been asked for comment. The NZ Defence Force had no comment on the strategy.
RNZ has also asked the US government if it has a specific role in mind for New Zealand - which is a minnow in terms of defence spending, but an outsize role as the world's fourth largest rocket launcher, due to Rocket Lab.
The US Embassy said it had made no request for New Zealand to expand its involvement in the JCO programme and no details about its expansion.
"If the programme is expanded, any additional New Zealand contribution would be a matter to be decided by New Zealand," it said on Monday.
The embassy did not comment about the international partnership strategy when asked.
The government has said it would bring in legislation this year to stop foreign military or intelligence interference in radar and other space infrastructure being built in New Zealand.
The SIS spy agency has said some entities proposed projects that might have helped foreign militaries and harmed New Zealand's interests, disguised to look like it was for civilian use.
'Accelerate or lose'
The US leaders behind the new strategy are trying to make their military more adaptable versus China, under the slogan "reoptimisation for Great Power Competition".
New Zealand has bought into parts of this, such as backing a Pentagon strategy to tap private space companies as a matter of course - but also to be able to order them to ramp up production in a crisis or war.
The overall goal is American space superiority globally by 2027. A new slogan "accelerate or lose" has been emerging in US space circles.
The space race extends to laser guns and electromagnetic jammers; satellites that can fight each other or target missiles; kamikaze drones in "kill webs"; and spotting of nuclear subs.
It ranges through to more defensive surveillance networks that also have civilian uses for spotting space debris or monitoring natural disasters.
Space links all other theatres of war, but is at huge and growing expense.
Reports have made clear that the US strategy is that allies can supplement strained Pentagon budgets.
In Europe, NATO allies are currently reeling from the Trump Administration spurning them in recent days, but at the same time are pledging to arm up, and the US President has told them to buy more American weapons.
In space, that would mean allies doing more designing, developing and deploying space technology, according to Godfrey.
"We can use existing collaborations such as CSpO" - the 10-nation Combined Space Operations that New Zealand was part of - "I'm looking forward to expanding that," another Pentagon leader said.
Already expanding
In addition to the CSpO, New Zealand is already engaged in the JCO, a US-led network that is not waiting for the strategy, but already expanding the military side of its joint military-civilian operations.
JCO hubs cover the globe, with one US-funded hub opening in Auckland in 2023. It trained a Japanese hub last year.
The network was now responding to a huge demand by US armed forces for commercial satellite imagery, reports said.
Such imagery has been used during the Ukraine war.
"We originally focused on protect and defend... but we have moved well beyond that," said a head of the network.
"These include electromagnetic spectrum operations, which the JCO took up in July, and tactical surveillance, reconnaissance and tracking (Tac-SRT), which it will begin as of Oct. 1 [2024]."
Electromagnetics can mean identifying jammers that upset satellites. Tac-SRT covers "delivering battlefield intelligence to military commands using commercial sources like Earth observation satellites".
The NZDF said it was aware of the mission area expansions, but was not involved.
RNZ has asked if it can rule out the Auckland hub being involved when the US demands it.
Various reports state the JCOs exist principally to augment military operations, to "create strategic advantage and support" for US combatant command.
The NZ government has primarily spoken about the JCO hub as engaged in unclassified work for civilian - not military - ends.
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