Panic in Europe as Putin sends spy satellites over huge country ‘on a daily basis’ | World | News
Russian spy satellites are flying over Germany on a daily basis as part of a wider expansion of Vladimir Putin’s spy satellite programme. According to the German government’s response to a parliamentary inquiry from the Green Party regarding space security, there are “a double-digit number of overflights daily.”
Sebastian Hartmann, Parliamentary State Secretary at the Federal Ministry of Defence, said there have been “several instances of interference with European and German satellites” over the past five years, with the number of overflights over Germany increasing accordingly. This report is said to be the latest sign that Russia is looking to expand its hybrid war with Europe into the realm of space.
The report comes after Boris Pistorius, the German Defence Minister, warned that Russia has recently been shadowing satellites used by German armed forces. This included two Intelsat satellites, which are being tracked by Russian “Luch/Olimp” satellites.
In response to Russia and China’s rapidly growing space capabilities, the German Government has adopted a new security strategy. €35 billion (£30.6 billion) has been earmarked for projects in space, including protection, reconnaissance and deterrence.
“We must, and this is the core task, also have and expand the capability for deterrence and defence in space. And deterrence there must also be credible,” Mr Pistorius said at the presentation of the strategy. “We are already seeing, for example, that Russia regularly disrupts the GPS signal in the Baltic Sea region.”
“The threat is real and serious”, warned Antje Notzold, a security expert at the Bundeswehr University in Munich, according to the SZ. “Space is a space for warfare“.
Here in the UK, the Russians have been stalking British military satellites, according to the head of the UK Space Command in October. In an interview with the BBC, Maj Gen Paul Tedman said Russia had been trying to jam military satellites with ground-based systems every week.
“They’re interested in what we’re doing and flying relatively close,” he said. “They’ve got payloads on board that can see our satellites and are trying to collect information from them.”
While UK military satellites have been fitted with counter-jamming technologies, Gen Tedman added that “we’re seeing our satellites being jammed by the Russians on a reasonably persistent basis”.
