China’s latest demonstration of physically moving one of its disabled satellites into the graveyard orbit was bringing in newer threats in the race to weaponise the space domain, a domain “hitherto considered relatively safe”, Chief of the Air Staff Air Chief Marshal (ACM) V.R. Chaudhari said on Thursday.

“Control of air has become a prerequisite for conduct of operations at all levels. Aerospace power continues to evolve and mutate, primarily fuelled by induction of new technology, emergence of new threats and evolution of new paradigms for war fighting,” he said. The unparalleled growth of aviation had revolutionised the character of warfare, ACM Chaudhari said at the 13th Jumbo Majumdar international seminar organised by the Centre for Air Power Studies.

“The inherent speed, reach, responsiveness and accuracy of air power make it a preferred choice for most operations. No other field has seen such a rapid transformation in technology as air power has seen in the last 120 years of its existence,” he pointed out. Technology in this domain was niche, proprietary and often under tight State control, he said.

The other challenge was to develop doctrines, training philosophy and concepts of operations. In this regard, it would require joint planning and execution of plans. “This brings the issue of command and control. Primacy of who will do what cannot be determined by a pro-rata system of who has a larger mass of forces or equipment,” he remarked.

Terrestrial, aerial and space domains were soon losing their individual identities and the boundaries between them were increasingly becoming blurred. As space-based assets became hubs of controlling terrestrial, underwater and aerial combat, they would also become centres of gravity that an adversary would like to target.

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