Army stands up new career field for enlisted soldiers focused on space operations
As the Army continues defining its role in the space domain, the service has established an enlisted military occupation specialty (MOS) for soldiers specializing in providing space-based capabilities on the battlefield.
The new MOS 40D will comprise hundreds of non-commissioned officers that will be trained and deployed by Army Space and Missile Defense Command, SMDC Commander Lt. Gen. Sean Gainey told reporters Friday during a media roundtable. By establishing the career field, the service will no longer have to borrow soldiers from other military occupational specialties and can focus on fostering space-specific careers within the Army.
“Here’s an opportunity to now take these soldiers and build that expertise, build a professional non-commissioned officer corps,” Gainey said. “So as we continue to move forward and we continue to develop next-level space capabilities, you will have the expertise within these soldiers and non-commissioned officers to continue to build that capability forward.”
Following the establishment of the Space Force in 2019, the Army transferred a number of its personnel and space-based missions — such as satellite communications operations and the Joint Tactical Ground Station (JTAGS) — to the new service. Since then, the Army has looked to adapt how it conducts operations in the space domain by developing service-specific capabilities and growing its cadre of space soldiers.
The Army published a space vision in 2024 outlining how SMDC would integrate space into daily operations, as well as plans to counter an adversary’s ability to employ space-based systems on U.S. troops. The document also emphasized the importance of having dedicated space personnel able to provide those capabilities to Army formations on the ground.
To that end, officers under the 40D will be trained to provide close support with space capabilities to conventional and special operations forces in the Army, protecting them from space-enabled attacks, Gainey said.
“Where the differentiation occurs is, the Space Force is going to focus on the on-orbit fight and some of the other areas — missile warning and other things,” he said. “We are focused on the tactical maneuver fight with our forces on the ground, pushing that capability forward so our forces have that capability at echelon, at formation, to be able to leverage the effects of a space-based system directly benefiting the operator on the ground.”
The 40D military occupational speciality is set to officially stand up Oct. 1, 2026, but the Army is already looking to recruit soldiers with applicable skillsets from across its formations, Gainey said. After soldiers attend initial qualification training, the specialists will go to SMDC’s Space and Missile Defense School in Colorado Springs, Colo., to learn how to operate electronic warfare and other space-based systems, Gainey said.
Then, space soldiers could be assigned to the multidomain task forces (MDTFs), theater strike effects groups (TSEGs), 1st Space Brigade, 100th Missile Defense Brigade or a space support element.
Over the past three years, SMDC has borrowed enlisted soldiers from other career fields — including air defense, signal corps and intelligence — to support operations. The new MOS will allow those soldiers to transition back to their original units, Gainey said.
