Military leaders have tried for nearly a decade to build an exoskeleton, sometimes cheekily called an Iron Man suit, to lighten the load for dismounted infantrymen. Variations of the idea had attracted the attention of Gen. Mark Milley, when he was chief of staff of the Army, and of U.S. Special Operations Command, which tried to build a suit known as the Tactical Assault Light Operator Suit, or TALOS.

In 2013, U.S. Special Operations Command sought proposals for TALOS, looking for a range of technologies that would minimize traumatic brain injury, reduce electromagnetic and acoustic signature and protect against advanced rifle rounds.

After five years, that program was replaced by another effort, the Hyper Enabled Operator, which had nothing to do with making troops more physically adept and instead focused on feeding them data for making better decisions.

But now, Ted Maciuba, deputy director of robotics requirements for the Maneuver Capability Development Integration Directorate at Army Futures Command, said that technology has advanced enough for the Army to slowly begin piecing together a version of the suit.

Speaking Wednesday at the Eurosatory trade show here, Maciuba listed more than 30 objectives for his team at Fort Benning in Georgia on a slide labeled “Maneuver Robotics, Programs, Initiatives and Strategy.” The very last line read: “Develop and field a Warrior Suit.”

“We will build that Warrior Suit in baby steps,” he said. “The first thing is: how are you going to allow a soldier to carry that extra 50 pounds and not feel like they’re carrying it? And then we will work our way up to upper body and we will start to integrate it so that it will be a Warrior Suit by 2040-ish. We have to take it in small steps.”

Maciuba said the directorate has a draft requirements document as well as data that shows current technology can reduce a soldier’s perceived load by about 20 percent.

In an interview with Defense News following his speech, Maciuba said the Army would build the suit “joint-by-joint.”

“What we have to do is actually pull the trigger, put out a requirements document that will spur industry to innovate, and then give us a solution. And I would hope that we’d be able to do that within the next year to 18 months,” he said. “The problem is we don’t know what we don’t know. It has to go out there. Soldiers have to break it. Soldiers have to use it. Soldiers have to give free feedback. And then we see how we go to that next step.”

Maciuba has talked publicly about the possibilities of such a suit for at least four years. He said he was inspired by reading Robert Heinlein’s science fiction novel “Starship Troopers,” in which soldiers wear powered armor, more than 50 years ago.

In a 2018 piece entitled “Help on the Battlefield” for the National Infantry Association, Maciuba included an excerpt from Heinlein’s book, quoting the benefits of such a system. “The beauty of an (exoskeleton is that) you don’t have to think about it. You don’t have to drive it, fly it, conn it, operate it: you just wear it, and it takes orders directly from your muscles,” Heinlein wrote.

The move confirmed for European military leaders how they had long suspected that future conflicts with Russia could play out.

While the discussion of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine at Europe’s largest army tradeshow being held this week near Paris focused on how militaries fight on the ground, Maj. Gen. Michel Friedling, the head of France’s Space Command, said Russia’s use of cyber and space weapons sent a critical message.

“What Ukraine has shown us well is that things will begin in [the] cyber and space domain before beginning on the ground,” he said Wednesday. “The cyberattack against Viasat was done the day before the beginning of the ground invasions. This is very significant. And this is very interesting. This is a big lesson. I would say it’s something we were thinking but now it’s real.”

Last month, U.S. and European leaders blamed Russia for a Feb. 24 cyberattack that disrupted internet service for tens of thousands of people in the critical moments that preceded the invasion of Ukraine. The attack on Viasat, a California-based provider of high-speed satellite broadband services and secure networking systems covering military and commercial markets worldwide, was meant to cripple Ukrainian command and control as Russian forces advanced, U.S. and U.K. officials said May 10.

A few months earlier, on Nov. 15, Russia destroyed one of its own satellites in an anti-satellite weapon test, according to the U.S. State Department, creating more than 1,500 pieces of orbital debris that led astronauts on the International Space Station to take cover on several occasions. Space debris-tracking company LeoLabs identified the satellite in question as Cosmos 1408.

The anti-satellite test showed Russia was “ready to deny us space capabilities to other players, even if it creates some debris,” Friedling said. “And even if it denies, to [Russia, themselves] the use of space capabilities.”

Friedling also said as companies such as Viasat or Maxar Technologies, which provided satellite imagery of Russian equipment before and during the conflict, or Elon Musk’s SpaceX, which offered communications services within Ukraine, become more entwined in the day-to-day events and provide military-like offerings, their role becomes blurry to adversaries.

“This is a question of the future,” he said.

U.S. Army Maj. Gen. Matthew Van Wagenen, the deputy chief of staff for operations at NATO’s headquarters in Brussels, told attendees that Russia’s shelling and force thus far in Ukraine could lead to a greater focus on “hard power.”

“Many fell asleep believing that the kind of warfare that we’re seeing in the Ukraine right now would never [have] happened again in Europe,” he said. “And here we are in 2022, and attrition warfare is going on in Western Europe again. This is significantly different. And I think what it’s going to force many governments to go back and look at is: What are those investments in defense that have been made or need to be made?”

Van Wagenen said some governments have come to believe they could “substitute hard power” for investments in cyber operations, electronic warfare and robots. As a result, they believed they could spend less on items such as heavy artillery, armor and infantry, he added.

While cyber operations, for example, have played a significant role in a series of conflicts during the last decade, they have not appeared to be at the forefront of Russia’s strategy in Ukraine.

“The threat of [electronic warfare], cyber … was no substitute for” the collection of Russian troops and equipment in Ukraine, he said. “This is vital for offensive and defensive operations. So it is directly imperative. The number of soldiers you can put on a battlefield makes a difference. … Attrition is as old as warfare. It is here to stay probably for the next 50-100 years, as much as we want to wish it away.”

His comments were echoed by Gen. Pierre-Joseph Givre, director of the French Army’s doctrine command.

“What is decisive is when you take the initiative on the ground,” he said. “It’s not technology, but it’s partly technology. Particularly, it’s a combination, it’s the art of war.”

Givre said while technology can compensate for weaknesses, such as an undermanned force, as was the case at the beginning of the conflict in Ukraine on the front lines of the Donbas region, massive firepower can ultimately make the difference

The move quickly proved prescient.

In March, a deepfake of Ukrainian Volodymyr Zelenskyy surfaced on social media and one of the country’s hacked news sites. The altered video appeared to show Zelenskyy telling Ukrainian soldiers to surrender to Russia.

It was exactly the type of cognitive warfare that the group of writers known as the Red Team want to render meaningless.

After French military leaders watched the broadcast, they accelerated the program’s timeline, Emmanuel Chiva, the head of France’s defense innovation agency, said Monday. He declined to offer more details, citing the program’s classified nature. Myriade is expected to launch in three years with a methodology to counter such threats.

The program is an example of how Russia’s invasion of Ukraine is forcing nations around the world to reconsider how they invest in future technologies.

In the U.S., the conflict is driving a greater emphasis on commercial technologies, such as satellite imagery from companies including Planet and Maxar. French and U.S. military leaders said Tuesday at the conference that officials need to invest in war games and capabilities that challenge long-held assumptions. For France, the conflict means a focus on fast, low-cost and resilient systems without sacrificing technological advancements.

“Yes, we have a crisis right now,” Chiva said on the first day of the Eurosatory conference in Paris. “We should also prepare for the future.”

Chiva, whose agency works to bridge new technology to military applications, pointed to the need for continued investments in artificial intelligence, robotics, space, drones and directed energy. He also called out the need for funding in less frequently discussed areas such as hypervelocity and seabed warfare.

In an interview with Defense News, Chiva pointed to a pair of projects from recent months that the invasion in Ukraine helped shape. In May, his office announced programs known as Colibri and Larinae, French names for hummingbirds and seagulls. The office wants to find ways for drones, once used only for intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance, to carry payloads that can help take out armored vehicles.

“The idea is to have a low-cost solution to be able to target and neutralize an armored vehicle within 5 kilometers or within 50 kilometers,” he said. “What we say that is we want something that’s easy to use, not a lot of training, low cost compared with very sophisticated designs for example. We want it fast, and we want a demonstration by 2024 and we don’t tell the people exactly what we want in terms of systems. It could be a swarm of drones … I don’t know. I don’t care. It’s quite new.”

More access: President-elect Joe Biden made daily briefings at the Pentagon and the State Department part of his formal platform. Such a move would improve transparency and strengthen relationships with allies about how national security leaders are thinking. Transparency also improves accountability. In 2018, Rep. Mike Gallagher, R-Wis., told Defense News: “I worry that by failing to discuss problems, we will only ensure there is no public pressure to fix them.” Still true. Also, more details about the U.S. Air Force’s F-35, or the Advanced Battle Management System, or the secret prototype of its next-generation fighter jet would be nice.

Less jargon: This is a wish list, so let me dream, OK? Elon Musk’s greatest contribution to national security may be the Falcon 9 rocket, and SpaceX’s Starlink constellation may eventually have greater consequences. But his work attempting to abolish unnecessary acronyms, particularly if adopted by more leaders in the military, would be a significant legacy. From a well-circulated 2010 letter Musk sent SpaceX employees:

“Individually, a few acronyms here and there may not seem so bad, but if a thousand people are making these up, over time the result will be a huge glossary that we have to issue to new employees. No one can actually remember all these acronyms and people don’t want to seem dumb in a meeting, so they just sit there in ignorance. This is particularly tough on new employees.”

CJADC2. Enough said.

A new effort at reform: Texas Rep. Mac Thornberry, the recently retired longtime Republican leader of the House Armed Services Committee, made defense reform one of the tenets of his time in office. Concurrently, the Pentagon’s efforts by its chief management officer found savings but did not involve the broad, sweeping measures envisioned by Congress and was shuttered. Finally, with a new administration, it’s unclear if former Defense Secretary Mark Esper’s “night court” efforts at finding savings will continue. A new serious, long-lasting effort at reform is needed.

A clearer vision for the Space Force: If there’s another pew-pew-pew joke about the Space Force, it’s too soon. But for decades the military has relied on space for an information advantage. A recent briefing from Morgan Stanley noted that the Pentagon doubled spending on space in the last five years, with at least $4 billion spent to mitigate risks. How the Space Force will work to protect or extend that advantage is a worthy discussion.

A shipbuilding plan for the Navy that sticks: Industry needs a plan, or at least a core of a plan, to be able to meet the service’s needs in the future. The back-and-forth “will they, won’t they” that has hampered shipbuilding plans in recent years — most notably a dead-on-arrival plan from the White House’s national security adviser — makes it more difficult for industry to prepare and raises questions about cost and capacity, neither of which are necessary.

A meaningful public conversation about cyber operations: The SolarWinds breach has revealed how little is known about how effectively the Defense Department protects its networks. The Pentagon’s supply chain cybersecurity program known as CMMC, or the Cybersecurity Maturity Model Certification, is admirable. But it is also looking like it is two years too late. The discussion around cyber in the federal government has centered on leaders taking greater responsibility for their agency’s cybersecurity. That approach is well-intentioned but has felt too punitive. In light of what SolarWinds has exposed, accelerating and funding protection measures, such as the adoption of zero trust, would be an easy first step.

Speedy delivery of a vaccine: I’m encouraged by the anecdotes of new ways for Defense Department employees to get work done during this time of coronavirus. I’m less optimistic the pandemic has presented opportunities for businesses or innovators trying to get in the door — the so-called lifeblood of innovation that we hear so much about. Instead, I worry that at a time of unprecedented change, leaders rely on what they already know.

The Outlook project features thoughtful ideas from some of the world’s most thoughtful minds in defense. It’s insightful. But also, do better than CJADC2.

The same day they hosted a closed-door briefing by both the Department of Defense and the Federal Communications Commission, leaders of the House Armed Services Committee formally asked the FCC to hit pause on its approval of spectrum use by Ligado Networks — and questioned why the commission appeared to not take into account classified information provided to them from the defense department.

In a letter to FCC Secretary Marlene Dortch, obtained by C4ISRNET, HASC Chairman Adam Smith, D-Wash., and ranking member Mac Thornberry, R-Texas, state that there are “still too many unknown impacts and remaining concerns” to move forward with the Ligado plan, which the DoD and other government entities have claimed will create interference with GPS capabilities over the continental United States, harming military use and the economic benefits from the system.

“The public and affected agencies cannot have confidence in the commission’s decision without resolution of these errors through a reconsideration and the implementation of additional safeguards acceptable to the GPS user community. Suspending the order and a full reconsideration of the proceeding is in the public interest,” the members concluded.

On April 20, the FCC unanimously voted to move forward with the request by Ligado to use part of the L-band spectrum. Since then, members of both the Senate and House Armed Services committees have led a rear-guard action, trying to get the order reversed or, at least, slowed down.

The DoD has opposed the FCC’s decision, claiming it would cause too much interference for the GPS system. Ligado’s case rests on the argument that the Pentagon’s testing does not accurately capture the mitigation plan the company has developed over the years. The firm also argues there is no proof that interference will be an issue.

The HASC leaders now join a bipartisan group of 32 senators in urging a reversal of the FCC decision. While the FCC is overseen by the Commerce committees, not the defense authorizers, six of the senators who signed the May 14 letter to the FCC serve on the Commerce, Science and Transportation Committee, and the defense leaders will likely have influence in internal discussions moving forward.

On May 8, 22 HASC members, including Smith and Thornberry, wrote to the FCC demanding answers about the technical analysis performed by the commission. Both men also signed a previous op-ed published by C4ISRNET with their Senate counterparts.

As part of that May 8 letter, the lawmakers requested copies of “the legal analysis that led the commissioners to their determination despite the unanimous concerns of the national security community,” as well as information on whether commissioners received a briefing from the DoD on the “classified test data contained in the classified report of DoD testing” included in a 2018 testing report.

The most recent letter, dated May 21, makes it clear that only some of the FCC commissioner offices responded to that request, and that those responses raised concerns for the HASC leaders. The letter was sent after the May 21 remote call-in.

On the question of the legal analysis, “the commission relied largely on assertions made by Ligado in arriving at their decision, disregarding the collective objection of 14 federal agencies and departments, testing by the Department of Defense and the Department of Transportation, and the countless other ex parte filings in the record of proceedings,” Smith and Thornberry wrote.

“In fact, at least one GPS device manufacturer alleges that Ligado misrepresented the nature of an agreement that was reached between the two parties, and that, despite Ligado’s repeated assertion, no ‘co-existence agreement’ exists. This misrepresentation, if true, could call into question the facts upon which this decision was based,” they added.

As to the question of the classified briefing, the lawmakers stated: “None of the responding commissioners were aware of the classified information the DoD provided to the commission. As a result, the commission failed to consider material information that may have fundamentally altered their decision.”

“Given the sensitive issues involved in this decision, much of the relevant information from the DoD is classified. Therefore, a thorough review of classified materials submitted by the DoD is an essential step prior to making a decision,” the lawmakers said.

Along similar lines, the two added that because of the classified nature of military bases and technology, it’s “highly likely neither the commission nor Ligado have a complete understanding of the costs and complexity involved to ensure the safety of operations of military equipment that cost the taxpayers hundreds of billions of dollars. The expense and time required to confirm or deny interference would be an unacceptable distraction from the Department’s mission and could be a significant imposition on DOD operations.”

That last point hits at a core defense of Ligado — that the company has offered to set up a system where it can fix any issues with GPS receivers that pop up for the department. Opponents of Ligado’s plan have argued that solution, which involves the Pentagon calling a 1-800 phone number to report issues, shows a lack of understanding of both the oft-classified nature of operations and the complexity of military technology.

In a statement released on May 27, Rep. Mike Turner, R-Ohio., the ranking member on the strategic forces subcommittee, said he was “concerned when I asked the FCC officials on the call if they had convinced any other agency this was good policy or if they had made an attempt to receive a classified briefing on the effects of their decision and their answer was no.”

Senate Armed Services Committee chairman Sen. Jim Inhofe, R-Okla., added that he was “disappointed but not surprised to hear the FCC has made no effort to review necessary, classified materials related to the Ligado application.” Inhofe has been a leading critic of the FCC’s decision.

While both the HASC and SASC leaders have publicly worked the issue, industry groups have also rallied in opposition to the Ligado deal. More than a dozen industry groups and businesses announced May 21 they would file a petition for reconsideration of the FCC’s recent decision to allow Ligado to operate in a spectrum near the Global Positioning System.

With the filings, the industry groups would essentially slow the approval process by forcing a formal review of the FCC’s unanimous decision.

Notably, the petitioners include Iridium, whose satellite services are used by the DoD, and Lockheed Martin, which has built several generations of the U.S. Air Force’s GPS satellites.

In a May 21 news release, Matt Desch, the chief executive of Iridium said: “The FCC’s Ligado action prioritizes economic windfalls to a few speculators over safety of life, national security and important private sector companies whose customers would be most upended by their harmful interference.”

Other petitioners are expected to include the Airline Pilots Association, the Association of Equipment Manufacturers, the Cargo Airline Association, the International Air Transport Association, Airlines for America, Trimble, and the Resilient Navigation and Timing Foundation.

The Federal Communications Commission announced April 20 that it has unanimously approved a long-standing application from Ligado Networks to operate in the L-band spectrum, overriding concerns from the Department of Defense and other government agencies which were worried the company’s plan will cause damage to the Global Positioning System.

The approval had been expected since Friday, when sources told C4ISRNET that the commission’s three Republican members all voted in favor of the measure; a simply 3-2 majority vote is required for passage.

The vote appears to bring to a close the latest chapter in an almost decade-long fight between the Pentagon and Ligado, previously known as LightSquared. C4ISRNET first broke the news that the FCC would move forward with Ligado’s request on April 10.

“I thank my colleagues for coming together on a bipartisan basis to support Ligado’s application,” said FCC chairman Ajit Pai. “This vote is another step forward for American leadership in 5G and advanced wireless services.”

The order included what the FCC described as “stringent conditions” to ensure that the GPS satellite signal would not experience harmful interference.

Sources told C4ISRNET that the push to consider the effort came from the White House, led by Larry Kudlow’s White House National Economic Council. Kudlow has expressed interest in the economic benefits of expanding the nation’s 5G capabilities. In addition, Attorney General Bill Barr has been a vocal supporter of Ligado’s bid, which he views as a way to grow America’s 5G capabilities to challenge China.

“Freeing up L-band spectrum for use in tandem with the C-band, as the Chairman proposes, should greatly reduce the cost and time it will take to deploy 5G throughout the country and would be a major step toward preserving our economic future,” Barr said in a Thursday statement. “I hope the full Commission moves forward quickly.”

In a statement late in the evening of April 17, a Pentagon spokesman reiterated the department’s complaints.

“Americans rely on our Global Positioning System (GPS) each day for many things: to locate citizens in need of emergency assistance through our E-911 system, to secure our financial system, to order and receive shipments, to travel by car for work and leisure, to facilitate commercial trucking and construction work, and even to make a simple cellphone call,” the statement read. “Our Departments rely on GPS each day for all those reasons as well to coordinate tactical national security operations, launch spacecraft, track threats, and facilitate travel by air and sea. The proposed Ligado decision by the Federal Communications Commission will put all these uses of GPS at risk. That’s why our Departments – and almost a dozen other federal agencies – are strongly opposed to the Ligado proposal and have asked for its denial.”

Wide opposition

L-band is described as the range of frequencies between 1 to 2 GHz. GPS, and other international navigation systems, rely on L-band because it can easily penetrate clouds, fog, rain and vegetation. Ligado owns a license to operate the spectrum near GPS to build what the firm describes as a 5G network that would boost connectivity for the industrial “internet of things” market. The company uses the SkyTerra-1 satellite, which launched in 2010 and is in geostationary orbit, and it has planned to deploy thousands of terminals to provide connectivity in the continental United States.

Over the years, Ligado officials have argued their system would use less spectrum, have lower power levels and reduce out-of-channel emissions. In the face of complaints from major commercial GPS companies such as Garmin and John Deere, Ligado has also offered to reduce the amount of spectrum it had initially planned. The company has also said it will work with government agencies to repair and replace equipment if necessary.

Those arguments have been dismissed by the Defense Department, which has focused on potential interference to the GPS network that could come from Ligado’s plans. As recently as March 24, defense leaders were sending letters to the National Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA), letters that were not made public, despite a request from the DoD, until they were reported on by C4ISRNET.

While the Pentagon has been the most vocal in its opposition to Ligado’s plan, it was hardly alone. A letter sent from the Air Force on Feb. 20 opposing Ligado’s plan was co-signed by the departments of Commerce, Interior, Justice, Homeland Security, Energy and Transportation, as well as NASA, the Federal Aviation Administration and the National Science Foundation.

The Aerospace Industries Association trade group also issued a statement April 16, saying the FCC’s decision to move forward with Ligado’s plan “disregards the serious concerns raised by various government agencies about the harmful impacts to GPS. We urge the FCC to reject the Chairman’s proposal and adequately protect the GPS network that underpins our nation’s military operations and the safety of our airspace.”

In the last week, bipartisan opposition to the application grew in Congress. Sen. Jim Inhofe, R-Okla., the chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee, Sen. Jack Reed, D-Rhode Island, the committee’s ranking member, Rep. Adam Smith, D-Wash., the House Armed Services Committee chair, and Rep. Mac Thornberry, R-Texas, the ranking member of the HASC, all issued statements against the proposal as did Rep. Peter DeFazio, D-Oregon, the chairman of the House Transportation and Infrastructure committee, and Rep. John Garamendi, D-Califorinia, who chairs the House Armed Services Committee subcommittee on readiness.

After the FCC announced plans to hold a vote on Ligado, Thornberry issued a second statement, indicating the potential for Congress to attempt to block the move.

“We must advance 5G development, but this is not the way to do it. The FCC cannot be allowed to overrule the unanimous opinion of America’s national security leaders,” said Thornberry, who is retiring after this year. “If they do, Congress should immediately revisit and revise their authority.”

The potential move, first reported April 10 by C4ISRNET, has drawn criticism from members of Congress and raised concerns among other government agencies.

FCC Chairman Ajit Pai circulated the draft order among his colleagues April 16, according to an agency news release. The five person commission will now have to vote on the measure, with a simple majority needed to implement the agreement. Industry watchers expect that that the measure will pass.

“After many years of consideration, it is time for the FCC to make a decision and bring this proceeding to a close,” Pai said. “We have compiled an extensive record, which confirms that it is in the public interest to grant Ligado’s application while imposing stringent conditions to prevent harmful interference. The draft order that I have presented to my colleagues would make more efficient use of underused spectrum and promote the deployment of 5G and Internet of Things services.” (The next generation of technology to boost wireless connectivity capabilities in known as 5G.)

The order, Pai said in the release, includes language to help protect incumbents, such as GPS, by reporting its base station locations and technical operating parameters before kicking off operations, continuously monitoring the transmit power of its base station sites and shutting down operations if necessary in the event of credible reports of interference.

“Although I appreciate the concerns that have been raised by certain Executive Branch agencies, it is the Commission’s duty to make an independent determination based on sound engineering,” Pai continued. “And based on the painstaking technical analysis done by our expert staff, I am convinced that the conditions outlined in this draft order would permit Ligado to move forward without causing harmful interference.”

Ligado’s leaders praised the decision in an April 16 statement.

“I have always believed that the L-Band spectrum can make a meaningful difference in our nation’s ability to connect,” said Ivan Seidenberg, chairman of Ligado’s board of directors. “There is no doubt that lower mid-band has a key role to play if we are to build the very best 5G networks, and it is clear now more than ever that we must do just that. The FCC’s decision to move the approval process forward is an important and forward-looking one that will advance the public interest and U.S. global leadership.”

Attorney General Bill Barr also praised the decision in an April 16 release.

“I applaud FCC Chairman Pai’s proposal to make available L-band spectrum, to be used together with C-band spectrum, for deployment of advanced wireless services, including 5G,” he said. “As I said in my speech at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, swift FCC action on spectrum is imperative to allow for the deployment of 5G. This is essential if we are to keep our economic and technological leadership and avoid forfeiting it to Communist China. Freeing up L-band spectrum for use in tandem with the C-band, as the Chairman proposes, should greatly reduce the cost and time it will take to deploy 5G throughout the country and would be a major step toward preserving our economic future. I hope the full Commission moves forward quickly.”

Later in the day, a coalition of commercial interests filed a petition with the FCC to dismiss the application.

“Given the tortured history of this proceeding and the current state of the record, the Commission and all parties concerned would be best served by starting with a clean slate, including Ligado itself,” a letter read. “The dockets related to the Ligado proceeding should be closed and Ligado’s pending applications should be dismissed. To the extent that Ligado desires to file new applications to fit some new business vision that is consistent with its existing authority, it of course may do so.”

The letter was signed by 22 organizations, including the Aerospace Industries Association, Lockheed Martin Corp., which has built many of the GPS satellites, and Iridium Communications.

In addition, the move frustrated leaders of defense committees in Congress.

“I’m not pleased, to say the least, that the chairman is pushing forward with a draft order approving Ligado’s application, especially in the midst of a global pandemic,” Sen. Jim Inhofe, R-Okla., the chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee, said in an email to C4ISRNET. “This action will amplify, rather than ease, current economic challenges. When people try to push bad policy through in the middle of a crisis, without much coordination with seemingly anyone else, it makes me wonder about their motives. I hope that the other commissioners will listen to the near-unanimous objections from the rest of the federal government – not to mention hundreds of industry leaders – and reject the plan. The risks to our national security are far too great to be ignored, and the precedent this would set is astonishingly misguided.”

The fight over Ligado’s request dates back almost a decade, when the company was known as LightSquared and had different ownership. But objection from the Pentagon has remained steady, with defense leaders saying Ligado’s plan would cause disruptions of the GPS system that could put war fighters in harm’s way.

Supporters, including Pai, have argued that technical changes from Ligado make it so that DoD systems should not be impacted.

Speaking to reporters April 13, Dana Deasy, the Pentagon’s top IT official, made it clear he trusts in the DoD’s evaluation and remains opposed to Ligado’s request.

“We have very strong technical evidence that would suggest moving forward with that proposal would cause harm to the adjacent GPS spectrum,” Deasy said. “Therefore, we continue to believe it’s in the best interests — and I believe I can say this on behalf of all the agencies — it’s in the interest of the government not to pursue the Ligado licensing request.”

The FCC move comes less than 24 hours after three key defense lawmakers, including Inhofe, sent a note to President Donald Trump, asking him to intercede and convince the FCC not to move forward with the plan.

While the president does not have direct control of the FCC, sources tell C4ISRNET that there is a push to support Ligado coming from key administration offices, including the White House National Economic Council. That office is led by Larry Kudlow, who has expressed interest in the economic benefits of expanding the nation’s 5G capabilities.

The letter, signed by Sen. Jim Inhofe, R-Okla., the chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee, Sen. Jack Reed, D-Rhode Island, the committee’s ranking member, and Rep. Mac Thornberry, R-Texas, the ranking member of the House Armed Services Committee, follows a recent report by C4ISRNET that the FCC appears poised to approve the application from Ligado Networks after years of delays.

Privately held Ligado Networks, formerly known as LightSquared, hopes to use spectrum in the L-band frequency that is near where GPS satellites operate. More than 10 federal agencies have opposed the application, led by the Pentagon.

“Ligado’s planned usage will likely harm military capabilities, particularly for the U.S. Space Force, and have major impact on the national economy,” the three congressman wrote. “Further, this plan would cost taxpayers billions of dollars to replace current GPS equipment, which could be rendered useless, and would force American families and businesses to use foreign space-based navigation and timing systems to replace the functions of GPS. This is fundamentally a bad deal for America’s national and economic security, and the timing could not be worse.”

Rep. Adam Smith, the chairman of the House Armed Services Committee, did not sign the letter.

The correspondence comes five days after the chairman of the House Committee on Transportation and Infrastructure teamed up with the chairman of the House Armed Services readiness subcommittee to demand answers from Secretary of Transportation Elaine Chao about the issue.

“While we share the desire to make America a leader in 5G networks, Ligado’s proposal is not essential to winning the 5G competition with China,” the April 15 letter from the defense leaders reads. “The bands of spectrum Ligado seeks are not the prime bands that the Department of Defense is working hard to share with industry, and there is grave concern across your administration about the harmful impact of this specific plan from the Departments of Defense, Commerce, Interior, Justice, Homeland Security, Energy, and Transportation, as well as NASA, National Science Foundation, U.S. Coast Guard, and FAA.

“These objections are based on strong evidence from years of testing and analysis that shows that the Space Force’s gold-standard service to the American people will suffer terribly if this proposal is approved.”

The congressmen also asked Trump to discuss the issue with Secretary of Defense Mark Esper and Gen. Mark Milley, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff.

In response, Doug Smith, Ligado’s chief executive, said in a statement that “the FCC is the expert agency charged by Congress with the exclusive authority to resolve Ligado’s proposal. DOD’s last ditch efforts to interfere with the FCC’s rigorous and exhaustive engineering analysis has nothing to do with science, facts or the law. So that only leaves politics.”

The letter to Trump comes amid renewed focus on 5G technology from key White House administration officials, specifically, from the White House National Economic Council. That office is led by Larry Kudlow, who has expressed interest in the economic benefits of expanding the nation’s 5G capabilities.

Ligado owns a license to operate the spectrum near GPS to build what the firm describes as a 5G network that would boost connectivity for the industrial “internet of things” market. The company uses the SkyTerra-1 satellite, which launched in 2010 and is in geostationary orbit, and it has planned to deploy thousands of terminals to provide connectivity in the continental United States.

Late on April 10, the National Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA) officially placed a series of memos sent by the Defense Department on this issue to the FCC’s filing system – memos that had been unreleased until C4ISRNET’s story reported on their contents. In addition, the NTIA associate administrator said in a letter to FCC Commissioner Ajit Pai that the organization cannot “reasonably reach” the conclusion that the Pentagon’s concerns have been resolved.

That comment led to a new filing by Ligado on April 12, in which the company blasted the NTIA statement, and the attached notes from the Pentagon, as “simply astounding” and “replete with fearmongering.” The company also argued that the DOD’s conclusions that GPS would be impacted are “based on irrelevant and misleading data,” most notably noting that the Air Force test cited in the service’s memo was based on an older plan the company has since abandoned.

The contract, which could last as long as 10 years, is part of the Maintenance of Space Situational Awareness Integrated Capabilities, or MOSSAIC, program. That contract is a follow-on to the Systems Engineering and Sustainment Integrator program, which L3Harris won in 2002.

The initial contract is worth $23 million.

In an April 1 announcement, L3Harris said the contract covered sustainment services for current and future ground-based space domain awareness sensors and space battle management command and control capabilities.

“Space as a warfighting domain has a complex and interdependent system supporting it from the ground, air and space,” Ed Zoiss, president of space and airborne systems at L3Harris said in the release. “L3Harris supports our customers in each of these domains, giving us a unique understanding of the ecosystem and the mission, and enabling us to make quick modifications, provide necessary sustainment and introduce new capabilities.”

This new contract expands the previous scope of work, which had focused on the U.S. Air Force’s Groundbased Electro-Optical Deep Space Surveillance System. That program includes three radars that track objects in geostationary orbits. The new contract also provides support to space situational awareness centers in California, Colorado, and Virginia.