Elon Musk's private aerospace company SpaceX has been making good money from government contracts since its founding, and Reuters learned at the end of this week that in the interests of US military intelligence, it has been forming a low-orbit network of hundreds of spy satellites since 2020, and The contract amount is measured at $1.8 billion.
The SpaceX division that is responsible for implementing this project is called Starshield. Back in 2020, the company began launching prototypes of reconnaissance satellites into orbit, which make it possible to quickly obtain images of almost any targets on the surface of the Earth for planning military operations at the tactical and operational level. The first prototypes of such satellites, of which there are now more than ten, were launched by SpaceX under a separate contract for $200 million starting in 2020, but a year later a contract was signed for $1.8 billion, covering obligations to launch several hundred satellites for this purpose.
It is emphasized that the Starshield reconnaissance network will operate independently of the existing Starlink constellation, but will also be located in low orbit. In addition to optical sensors, SpaceX reconnaissance satellites will require equipment for high-speed information transmission via optical channels, which is being developed for the company’s needs by third-party contractors. The entire project remains secret, but the first mention of it was made on the pages of The Wall Street Journal back in February of this year. According to Reuters, the Starshield program is being implemented in the interests of the US National Office of Military Space Intelligence (NRO). Experts explain that if this initiative is successful, the US military departments will receive a powerful intelligence system that will allow them to quickly track the movements of enemy ground forces almost all over the world.
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