Some thoughts on @realDonaldTrump's Space Force comments today.
1) It's at least the third time he has said something like this publicly, so it's not completely out of the blue (no pun intended, Air Force).
1) It's at least the third time he has said something like this publicly, so it's not completely out of the blue (no pun intended, Air Force).
2) The president can't just create a new military service on his own. It requires congressional authorization.
3) A similar provision passed the House last year that would have created a Space Corps within the Dept. of the Air Force (like the Marine Corps is to the Navy) but the Senate did not agree to it.
4) The compromise in congress last year was to take a pause and study the issue, including a report due back to congress by the end of this year with a road map for creating a separate Space Force. Here's a summary of the compromise: csis.org/analysis/congr…
5) The Air Force was the main resistance to creating a Space Corps last year. Probably the most significant thing about this announcement today is that it undermines the Air Force's ability to continue fighting this.
6) Creating a Space Force would not necessarily mean a huge increase in funding. We already have space forces within the military, this would just be reorganizing them under a single chain of command. Yes, there would be some extra overhead costs, but it doesn't have to be huge.
7) So the near-term practical effect of all this is that the president can direct DoD to come up with a plan and start preparing to create a Space Force, but he still needs congress to authorize it.
