On 13 May, General Gregory Guillot, commander of US Northern Command and of North American Aerospace Defense Command (NORAD), revealed that “a number” of prototype systems with Air Moving Target Indicator sensor capability are “on orbit now”.

The revelation came during a hearing before the Senate Armed Services Strategic Forces subcommittee. The use of space-based sensors to track moving targets in the sky is not a new idea and is being pursued, most notably, for detection and tracking in particular of hypersonic threats. Multi-satellite constellations to ensure regional coverage against hypersonic threats are something the Space Development Agency (SDA) of the US Space Force is already working upon and interest in this capability is only growing within the ambitions of the Trump administration for the “Golden Dome for America” shield against air threats.

The SDA is specifically working on a “Tracking Layer”, a vast constellation of small, relatively cheap satellites in Low Earth Orbit that will “provide global indications, warning, tracking, and targeting of advanced missile threats, including hypersonic missile systems”. In order to work, the “tracking” satellites have to be supported by an even greater number of “Transport Layer” satellites that will relay and distribute the tracking information all the way down to the relevant “users” on Earth. Northrop Grumman, Lockheed Martin and start-up York Space Systems are all building competing satellites for the Transport and Tracking layers project.

The launch of Tranche 1 satellites (126 Transport Layer satellites, 35 Tracking satellites, and 12 tactical demonstration satellites, the first “operational” systems within the mega-program) under this project has repeatedly been postponed and no launch has yet taken place, but the 27 satellites of the “Tranche 0” are all in orbit and have been since early 2024. Of those 27, 8 are “Missile Warning” satellites and probably are among the “prototypes” Guillot was referring to.

No further detail was provided; classified research and development programs are also most likely involved.

Vice Chief of Space Operations General Michael Guetlein said in September 2024 that an initial space-based capability to track moving targets in the air and on land would be available by the early 2030s.

Extra funding to accelerate space-based AMTI capability is part of the 150 billion “reconciliation” package pushed in Congress and there reportedly is a push against the USAF to embrace this novel technology more broadly and decisively. Specifically, the USAF is reportedly being instructed to rethink the planned procurement of 26 E-7 WEDGETAIL radar aircraft to instead relay on space-based sensors.

The USAF is understood to be resisting this pressure as it believes that the use of an air-breathing aircraft platform remains essential at least at this point in time. In a May 6 hearing before the House Appropriations Defense subcommittee itself, the Chief of Staff of the USAF, General David Allvin personally insisted that satellites are not yet able of performing “the full scope” of airborne early warning and control as performed currently by the aging E-3 SENTRY and in the future by the new E-7As. Allvin specifically insisted that “right now, the E-7 is the platform that delivers what the E-3 can with greater capability”.

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