Issue 75

12 Jun 2023: Kristen Burke of the China Aerospace Studies Institute (CASI), published a report detailing China’s intent to use of laser dazzling and other reversible counterspace laser effects. Burke notes it is highly likely the PLA has a mobile laser dazzling capability, and observing these vehicles would be extremely useful and it is time to shift focus from collecting on the Bohu laser development facility.

– People’s Liberation Army (PLA) media and academy theorists more often discuss the benefits of laser dazzling and other reversible counterspace laser effects.

– The operational effectiveness of satellite dazzling is a repeated PLA priority to slow the ‘opposing side’s’ information acquisition cycle. The PLA’s Academy of Military Sciences 2013 textbook on space operations says, “[S]oft kills…such as [with] low power lasers…can achieve the effects needed in operations without producing other collateral damage.” The text further explains that reversible counterspace attacks, or “soft kills,” with lasers are an important means of “commanding space” because “they are not easy to discover, and it is hard to trace their source, so that it is possible to conceal operational intentions fairly well.”

– PLA media in January 2021 stated that “laser blinding weapons have entered the golden age,” and included dazzling satellites as one of the many operationalized uses.

– The SSF conducted a technical study on the use of ground-based laser dazzling “stations” to carry out camouflage and concealment operations. They determined that in order to prevent a low Earth orbit satellite constellation from imaging a sensitive military operation for one hour, they would need anywhere between 17-27 laser dazzling stations to achieve the minimum of a 72% imagery suppression rate.

-PLA units are working on laser weapons for multiple uses and it it difficult to determine what PLA papers are talking about anti-satellite weapons versus anti-UAV, anti-missile, anti-ship, and anti-tank laser applications.

– It is possible the PLA already has mobile laser ranging capabilities capable of and used for dazzling satellites. CASI flagged the TROS1000 vehicle for the Arms Control Wonk and the Middlebury Institute of International Studies based on their extensive commercial imagery analysis and recent publications. They found a similarly looking domed truck in August 2022 at what is thought to be the Xinjiang facility supporting the PLA’s direct assent anti-satellite missile tests (41.53666, 86.35573). CASI pursued this lead and determined that this truck is camouflage green in color imagery, and was parked at the facility, with the dome closed between July 23, 2022 and September 14, 2022.