The DownLink Podcast

This week in Paris Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi and French President Emmanuel Macron announced a further deepening of their defence cooperation. This time it includes the space domain. To understand why this agreement is significant, Laura Winter speaks with Narayan Prasad, a long-time space entrepreneur based in Berlin, and Pranav Satyanath, a research analyst with the Takshashila Intitution’s Strategic Studies Programme in Bangalore.

China celebrates Space Day of China with announcements, putting the U.S. on notice that it means to get to and stay on the moon sooner rather than later, according to Malcolm Davis, a senior policy analyst at the Australian Strategic Policy Institute. Laura Winter also speaks with Hawkeye 360’s CEO John Serafini and National Security Space Association Executive Director and Founder Steve Jacques about their announcement of a new commercial space initiative that aims to provide immediate humanitarian aid to the people of Ukraine. You can find more information about SIFU here: https://www.he360.com/space-industry-launches-humanitarian-initiative-to-support-ukraine/

U.S. Vice President Kamala Harris announced that the United States is unilaterally giving up direct-ascent anti-satellite (ASAT) testing. This type of ASAT test is known to create orbital debris, which almost everyone agrees is a danger to space-based infrastructure. But was this ban the right thing to do? That depends on the perspective. Laura Winter speaks with U.K. Amb. Aidan Liddle, Britain’s Permanent Representative to the U.N. Conference on Disarmament in Geneva, Switzerland, and spacepower expert Col. M.V. “Coyote” Smith, USAF (Ret.), who is an Associate Professor and Director at the Air Command and Staff College, at Maxwell Air Force Base, in Montgomery, Ala.

Most of the world's space agencies and companies are winding down their cooperation with Russia, while other major space-faring nations are making agreements. Laura Winter speaks with the Secure World Foundation’s Washington, D.C. Office Director Victoria Samson, who explains what this may mean for future international cooperation in creating a stable space environment.

Too bold? Or not bold enough? The U.S. Secretary of the Air Force revealed how the Biden Administration intends to shape the U.S. Space Force’s mission and future this week at Space Symposium. Laura Winter hosts a discussion with Peter Garretson, a senior fellow at the American Foreign Policy Council, coauthor of Scramble for the Skies The Great Power Competition to Control the Resources of Outer Space, and the host of AFPC's Space Strategy Podcast; Christopher Stone who is a senior fellow for space studies at the Mitchell Institute for Aerospace Studies, and the author of Reversing the Tao: A Framework for Credible Space Deterrence; and Makena Young is an associate fellow with the Aerospace Security Project at the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS).

The Biden Administration’s FY 2023 budget request dropped this last week, with $24.5 billion for the U.S. Space Force. Laura Winter hosts a discussion with Charles Beames, who before becoming, the chairman of the board for York Space Systems and the SmallSat Alliance, was a Pentagon insider responsible for all space and intelligence acquisitions; Peter Garretson, a senior fellow at the American Foreign Policy Council, coauthor of "Scramble for the Skies The Great Power Competition to Control the Resources of Outer Space", and the host of AFPC's "Space Strategy Podcast"; Christopher Stone who is a senior fellow for space studies at the Mitchell Institute for Aerospace Studies, and the author of "Reversing the Tao: A Framework for Credible Space Deterrence".

While Russia’s state-owned space corporation Roscosmos is hunting for customers, there’s anecdotal evidence that some in the commercial space industry outside of the country are seeing a bump in sales related to Russia’s war in Ukraine. Laura Winter speaks with Matt Desch, the CEO of the U.S.-headquartered mobile satellite communications company Iridium, and with Hans Steiner the CTO of the European satellite signal monitoring and geolocation service provider Atos as well as the company’s Director of Global Sales Eias Daka.

It almost slipped under the radar… The U.S. Space Force Space Training And Readiness Command, or STARCOM, released its planning doctrine, the foundation of how to plan the execution and leveraging of spacepower. This is the first space warfighting doctrine in roughly 18 months since the new branch released its inaugural doctrine, "Space Power". Laura Winter’s guest is Christopher Stone, a senior fellow for space studies at the Mitchell Institute for Aerospace Studies. Stone breaks it down, showing where he believes this fundamental guidance succeeds and where some re-engineering is required.

Resistance against the Russian war in Ukraine comes in many forms, such as just remaining at work and refusing to leave. In this episode, Laura Winter speaks with two former heads of the State Space Agency of Ukraine, Volodymyr Usov and Lyubomyr Sabadosh, and their colleague Liliya Shevchuk, the director of the country’s Space Initiatives Center. But first, Winter speaks with Homer Hickam, a retired NASA aerospace engineer and a New York Times best-selling book author, who wrote a Washington Post opinion piece, published on March 9, with the headline “Our space partnership with Russia can’t go on.”

How is the space sector reacting to Russia’s war in Ukraine and mitigating against an uptick in cyber threats to space systems? Laura Winter speaks with Dan Dumbacher, Executive Director of the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics, or AIAA; and with Frank Backes, Senior Vice president of Kratos Federal Space and Board Chair of the Space Information Sharing and Analysis Center, or Space ISAC; Sam Visner, Technical Fellow at the Mitre Corporation and Vice Chair of the Space ISAC; and the organization’s Executive Director Erin Miller.