British military uses ground-based jamming system against foreign satellites

The British military is fighting threats posed by foreign satellites using a ground-based jamming system, a military source told the BBC.

The BBC's interlocutor said that the British military has been using this ground-based system for a year. It can, in particular, prevent satellites of hostile states from monitoring the movements of British submarines with nuclear missiles or other secret operations, such as those involving special forces. In recent years, British governments have primarily identified Russia and Iran as hostile states.

Experts say several countries have similar ground-based anti-satellite systems. Last year, the head of Britain's Space Command said Russia was attempting to jam British satellites from the ground on a weekly basis.

The BBC's interlocutor assures that British electronic warfare systems are “the best in the world, and even more,” reports BBC defense correspondent Jonathan Beale.

The chief of the Royal Air Force on Wednesday said Britain faces unprecedented threats from space, and the Ministry of Defense announced the creation of a new unit, the Space Effects Squadron, to combat these threats.

British Defense Secretary Wes Streeting, speaking at the British Space Conference on Wednesday, said that if the GPS signal were lost, for example, the British economy would lose 1.4 billion pounds ($1.85 billion) every day.

“It is because of our dependence on space that the threats from our adversaries in space are growing,” Streeting said. “We depend [on satellites] for everything from weather forecasts and energy supplies to financial transactions, satellite navigation, mobile communications and Amazon deliveries.”

The loss of all these amenities, according to Streeting, would not only affect the daily life of the British people, but also undermine their trust in the institutions of the state.

Threats from Britain's adversaries, according to the minister, are constantly becoming larger and more sophisticated, and these problems in space reflect geopolitical changes on Earth.

Last week, the United States admitted for the first time that it had deployed weapons in space to protect its satellites.

China and Russia condemned the announcement, but the United States had previously accused both countries of developing and deploying weapons in orbit, ranging from jammers and satellite-blinding lasers to kinetic weapons.

In May this year, the Royal Air Force (RAF) tracked a series of dangerous maneuvers by five Russian satellites as they approached two Finnish civilian satellites.

RAF commander Air Chief Marshal Harvey Smith said in June that a constellation of Russian satellites was interfering with GPS signals in Europe and Canada.

On Wednesday, at the same conference where Minister Streeting was speaking, Air Chief Marshal Harvey Smith said Britain was now seeing a rise in "irresponsible and provocative behavior" from its adversaries.