Singapore, Feb 4, 2026, 03:13 (SGT)
- Germany is weighing a €35 billion military space spending plan, its space commander said
- Plan centres on an encrypted SATCOM network of more than 100 satellites
- Berlin is looking at “non-kinetic” ways to disrupt hostile satellites, including jamming and lasers
Germany is weighing investments ranging from spy satellites and space planes to lasers under a 35 billion euro ($41 billion) military space spending plan aimed at countering what it sees as growing threats from Russia and China in orbit, the commander of its space command said.
The push matters because Berlin is treating space less like a support function and more like a place where wars can be won or lost. Major General Michael Traut said the environment above the Earth has become “sharply more contested” since Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022.
At the centre is SATCOM Stage 4, an encrypted military constellation of more than 100 satellites. Traut said Germany wants to mirror the model used by the U.S. Space Development Agency, which deploys low-Earth-orbit satellites — spacecraft flying relatively close to Earth — for communications and missile tracking.
Traut said Germany will prioritise domestic and European suppliers for the programme. The comments come as Rheinmetall has held talks with German satellite maker OHB about a joint bid for an unnamed German military satellite project, while Airbus, Thales and Leonardo are pursuing a European satellite communications alternative to Elon Musk’s Starlink.
The plan also covers intelligence-gathering satellites, sensors and systems designed to disrupt adversary spacecraft, including lasers and equipment that could target ground-based infrastructure, Traut said. The “ground segment” is the control stations and links that operate satellites from Earth.
Traut said Germany would not field destructive weapons in orbit that could generate debris, but would look at “non-kinetic” options — tools that interfere with signals or electronics rather than physically smashing a satellite. “Space has become an operational or even warfighting domain,” he said. Economictimes
That toolkit includes jamming, lasers and steps against ground control stations, he said. Jamming is electronic interference that can block or distort communications.
Traut also pointed to so-called inspector satellites, small spacecraft that can manoeuvre close to other satellites. Russia and China have already deployed them, he said, and they widen the range of ways a rival can threaten space systems without firing a missile.
“There is a broad range of possible effects” in the electromagnetic and laser spectrum, Traut said, describing a mix of actions that could hinder or disable hostile space systems.
He also framed deterrence as cross-domain. “If you do something to us in space, we might do something to you in other domains as well,” Traut said, adding that targeting the ground segments of a space system could deny an adversary access.
But the programme is still being shaped, and Traut gave few concrete details on procurement timelines beyond “the next few years.” The scale of SATCOM Stage 4 and the politics around what counts as defensive disruption in orbit will help decide how fast Germany can turn the plan into hardware.
