Meink: Space Force has deployed space control weapons to orbit

NATIONAL HARBOR, Md. — Secretary of the Air Force Troy Meink announced Monday that the Space Force has deployed weapons into space in order to combat adversary threats.

“Today, we continue to ensure we remain ready to meet the challenges of evolving threats wherever they exist. This is why the United States now has on-orbit space control weapons capable of defending the joint force against hostile adversary actions,” Meink said during his keynote speech at AFA’s annual Air, Space and Cyber conference.

The announcement is the first time a Pentagon official has publicly confirmed the existence of U.S. space-based weapons. After years of officials keeping quite about efforts to field and operate on-orbit space weapons, the Space Force began openly discussing its ability to conduct warfare in the space domain in 2025 and published a framework to outline its operational concepts.

Space control can refer to both offensive and defensive warfare, electromagnetic warfare and other counterspace operations. Meink did not provide any additional details as to what type of space control weapons are on orbit, nor did he say how many. 

However, the Space Force’s warfighting framework notes that the service is interested in both kinetic and non-kinetic offensive weapons. Some of the on-orbit operations those systems could perform include orbital strike and space link interdiction.

Orbital strike includes actions that “destroy, disrupt or degrade adversary space platforms in the space domain” either through kinetic or non-kinetic effects, according to the Space Force’s framework. The ops may be conducted by pursuit operations — forces that must move towards an adversary space system to deploy weapons — or standoff operations from a distance.

Space link interdiction operations are solely performed using non-kinetic means, employing electromagnetic or cyber attacks to prevent adversaries from using their own space-based systems against the Pentagon and its allies.

The Space Force could also deploy a number of defensive systems to protect its on-orbit assets through escort operations, counterattacks and suppression of adversary counterspace targeting.