U.S. Air Force Secretary Troy Meink acknowledged for the first time that the United States has weapons in orbit. The announcement at the ...
U.S. Air Force Secretary Troy Meink acknowledged for the first time that the United States has weapons in orbit.
The announcement at the Air, Space, and Cyber Conference on Monday comes days after a Wall Street Journal report linking Chinese satellite imagery to Iranian strikes on U.S. service members in Jordan that killed three and injured four others.
“Today, we continue to ensure we remain ready to meet the challenge of evolving threats wherever they exist,” said Meink, who also oversees the U.S. Space Force. “This is why the Space Force now has on-orbit space control weapons capable of defending the joint force against hostile adversary action.”
The Air Force secretary refused to answer questions regarding the nature of the weapon’s capabilities or who developed the system.
While the Space Force has not acknowledged any specifics about the new system, actions taken by President Donald Trump and Congress provide insight into what the system could be.
Trump created the Space Force as the sixth branch of the military in 2019 when he signed the National Defense Authorization Act with the support of Congress. President Trump and military officials have warned about the growing threat posture of U.S. adversaries like Russia and China in space.
In January 2025, Trump signed an executive order titled “The Iron Dome for America” to set up a project similar to the U.S.-funded development of Israel’s Iron Dome missile defense system.
The order and project, rebranded as the “Golden Dome” project, expressly recognizes “the threat of attack by ballistic, hypersonic, and cruise missiles, and other advanced aerial attacks, remains the most catastrophic threat facing the United States,” and that “the threat from next-generation strategic weapons has become more intense and complex with the development by peer and near-peer adversaries of next-generation delivery systems and their own homeland integrated air and missile defense capabilities.”
The order directs the government to develop kinetic and non-kinetic interception methods, tracking and other systems to defend the homeland. Trump’s “Golden Dome” order also emphasizes the need to develop these capabilities with allies.
In December 2025, Trump signed another executive order further emphasizing the need to protect American interests in space, including “ensuring the ability to detect, characterize, and counter threats to United States space interests from very low-Earth orbit and through cislunar space, including any placement of nuclear weapons in space.”
The House Appropriations Committee passed the Defense Appropriations Act of Fiscal Year 2027 in June 2026. In the accompanying report, the committee warned that “adversaries, particularly the People’s Republic of China, are rapidly fielding counterspace weapons that threaten critical joint force capabilities in communications, positioning-navigation-timing, missile warning, and intelligence.”
Congress has also put forward a plan to build space cooperation with other allies like Poland. According to a report from Forbes, Poland’s space industry is making large strides in commercial and military sectors. The National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2027 establishes the U.S.-Poland military space cooperation program. The program’s purpose is to “strengthen military cooperation between the United States and the Republic of Poland in support of space-enabled military operations, resilience, and preparedness.”
It is not clear whether U.S. allies contributed to the weapon system referenced by the Air Force secretary.
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