UK Space Commander Major General Paul Tedman (AS1 Leah Jones. © UK MoD Crown Copyright 2024)
7 min read
With Europe preparing for war, the UK space commander, Major General Paul Tedman tells Sophie Church it is ‘highly likely’ the first assault on Britain will be in space
With Russia arming for a wider war against Europe, the UK is preparing for an attack on home soil. But just as Vladimir Putin invaded Ukraine by hacking its satellites, the UK space commander tells The House it is “highly likely” this first assault on the UK will be in space.
“You need to secure the space domain before you can do anything,” he says. “You need to be able to control the space domain in order to secure the air domain, and that will provide you freedom of manoeuvre in the land and the maritime domain.”
The House has joined Major General Paul Tedman at RAF High Wycombe for his first full sit-down interview since assuming the role last year. Modelled on a quintessential English village – a ruse to lie undetected from the Luftwaffe in the 1930s – the base is now home to UK Space Command, tasked with defending the UK in space.
Where the armed forces have historically combined air, land and sea capabilities, space has become an increasingly important arena for war.
But where our enemies are rapidly developing weapons for space, the UK is lagging behind. The UK launched its first spy satellite Tyche just last year. Only around one per cent of the UK’s defence budget is currently allocated to it, placing us in the bottom half of the G20 nations league table for spending.
With the French allocating three per cent of its defence budget to space, and the US five, the commander says: “We’ve got to do more if we’re going to have nationally separable capabilities going forward.” While he refuses to say what that figure should be, he says it is “more important to get our investment really sharp into the right areas”.
Does Labour truly understand the threats we face?
“It’s really clear to me that the government does get it,” says the commander. “I think the demonstrable recommendations in the Strategic Defence Review [SDR] would highlight that defence gets it too. I was really pleased with the outcome of the Defence Review. For me, it elevated space to parity with the more traditional domains.”
UK Space Command is now competing with the Royal Navy, army and Royal Air Force for the spoils of the SDR. But Tedman concedes that Space Command, founded in 2021, has “a long way to go until we are at the mass and the spend that the other domains get in these big reviews that happen”.
Ministers will use the summer to “set out the order” in which government will spend the money pledged in the SDR, procurement minister Maria Eagle told The House from RAF High Wycombe.
Parliament’s Public Accounts Committee has branded this delay to publishing an investment plan “entirely unsatisfactory”. However, Tedman says he would rather the government “do it well than do it quick and badly”.
But if we were to fight a battle tomorrow, would our space capability be strong enough to counter that threat?
“It depends what the threat is,” he replies, appearing to admit there are certain attacks the UK would not be able to withstand.
“I think the gaps in capabilities across defence are what the SDR is looking at, and government is doing the prioritisation work to then say: where is the greatest risk, and therefore, where should we put the investment?”
If it were up to him, the commander would address the UK’s current weakness, which he describes as our “ability to deter adverse reactions”.
The House understands this relates to our counterspace systems – missiles launched from Earth to destroy satellites, weapons placed into orbit and manoeuvred to attack an enemy satellite, or earth-based sensors which can detect and track satellites, for example.
“No one wants a war in space, and it’s certainly not inevitable. But the best way to do that, as the SDR says, is to have a credible deterrence. If we can move a credible deterrence on a little bit, that would be where I would focus my efforts.”
While the commander thinks it would be “very unusual” to be fighting the next war alone in space, he insists the UK must bolster its sovereign capabilities.
“If all else fails, I do think we need the ability to nationally protect our interests, and understanding what those areas are is really important.”
However, the government has been criticised by commercial partners – who have become integral to our defensive capabilities – for its incoherent strategy on space.
“There is quite a lot of money flying through different departments in space, but each of those has slightly different agendas and different approaches,” Nik Smith, UK regional director for UK and Europe at Lockheed Martin, told The House. “It’s confusing for the sector.”
In seeming acceptance that space has not benefited from a clear strategy until now, the commander says the “big effort cross-government to prioritise and cohere, being led by the Cabinet Office” is a “good start”, with ministers Chris Bryant and Eagle “bringing that coherence” by attending one of the meetings organised by the Cabinet Office.
“I’m confident there’s the right amount of attention on space. We’re going to use the existing processes and we’ll get better coherence and prioritisation as we go forward,” he says.
The relationship between the commander and government appears less fractious than that of other armed forces chiefs.
Ahead of the SDR’s publication, Admiral Sir Tony Radakin, the chief of the defence staff, and three service chiefs were blocked by No 10 from giving interviews to the media, The Times reported. Downing Street was also accused of blocking military chiefs from speaking on the record at a RUSI conference in June, the paper later reported.
The commander, glancing at a nearby press officer throughout the interview, says he has not had the same experience. “No one’s put any restrictions on me from talking to the media,” he insists. “It just makes good sense that we keep an element of ambiguity to what we’re doing.”
Still, there’s a “space blindness” in the public consciousness that needs addressing.
“It’s challenging to bring enthusiasm to the British public about space and its importance,” the commander says.
“If you want to talk about investment into the army, you can go and visit a tank. If you want investment into the air force, you can go and see a jet.
“It’s really difficult for me to demonstrate how we would invest money and show the investment in space.”
But with the prospect of war increasingly likely, UK Space Command is lifting the veil on the UK’s space operations. Before the interview, officers demonstrate how they would respond to an unknown satellite being launched into orbit. We hear of the 3,000 risks to UK satellites a month; and the development of a nuclear anti-satellite weapon allegedly put into orbit by Russia last year.
“I know from talking to the [other armed forces] chiefs on a regular basis, they’re all really clear,” says Tedman.
“As the threat increases, tech increases, and we become more dependent on space, it’s going to become more and more of a focus.”
