Space operations center for coalition partners to open this summer

The Air Force will open its Coalition Space Operations Center this summer at Vandenberg Air Force Base, CA, to complement the National Space Defense Center, a service official said at an Air Force Association event today.

Allies and partner countries can use the CSpOC as a forum to build joint space warfighting expertise even if their capabilities are less mature than those of the United States, according to Maj. Gen. Joseph Guastella, Air Force Space Command's director of integrated air, space, cyberspace and intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance operations.

"We're using examples from warfighting in the air domain and we're bringing it to space," he said. "It's real, it's happening, OK, and that's something that we're very excited about."

U.S. Strategic Command Chief Gen. John Hyten announced the CSpOC initiative Dec. 2 at the Reagan National Defense Forum. Coalition partners cannot participate in the NSDC because it presents classified information from the intelligence community.

"The center will bring together our allies, the commercial sector and the intelligence community to create unity of effort in the space domain," spokeswoman Maj. Meghan Liemburg-Archer told Inside Defense last year.

Guastella also noted the Air Force has more work to do to improve classified information-sharing with its partners, among other interoperability challenges, but suggested organizations like the CSpOC are still valuable tools to enable a joint force.