Gen. Stephen Whiting doesn’t mince words. “They’re putting operational systems up within orbit reach of our high-value satellites,” the head of US Space Command told the Center for Strategic and International Studies this week. Russia, he says, has moved beyond tests. It’s fielding co-orbital anti-satellite weapons—satellites that stalk America’s most prized orbital eyes, ready to strike.
These aren’t distant threats. Picture nesting dolls in space: larger Russian satellites eject smaller ones, which maneuver close, then release high-velocity projectiles. That’s the Nivelir program, per US assessments. Launched from Plesetsk Cosmodrome last May, the latest suspect shadowed the National Reconnaissance Office’s USA 338 Keyhole-class spy satellite. Precise timing aligned their orbital planes. A few minutes off, and the hunter misses its prey.
Whiting compares it to flying a new fighter jet near Russian bombers patrolling Alaska. Provocative. Intentional. “It’s evident Russia was deploying a space weapon there, and they’re putting it into an orbit where they can reach critical US national security satellites.” Tests began in 2013. Close approaches hit in 2019. Now? Operational.
US sensors track it all. Ground radars. Space telescopes. Tens of thousands of objects cataloged. Nivelir gets priority. “If one of these Russian weapons systems starts to maneuver, we want to be able to detect that very quickly,” Whiting said. Operators of vulnerable birds get instant warnings. Distance stays at a few dozen miles—for now.
But why co-orbital? Ground-launched ASATs like Russia’s Nudol create debris fields, as seen in the 2021 test that menaced the International Space Station. Co-orbital killers are cleaner. Sneakier. They lurk in the same orbit, inspect, then kill without junking low-Earth orbit for everyone. Russia eyes geosynchronous orbits too, over 20,000 miles up. A recent launch hinted at that reach.
Russia’s space sector struggles—underfunded, sanctioned, quality issues plague it. Yet a US intelligence assessment notes: “Russia remains a capable space power, even while its space industry suffers from systemic underfunding, quality control issues, international sanctions, and export controls.” Moscow seeks offsets. Nuclear. Cyber. Space. Conventional forces lag; space offers asymmetry.
Whiting again: “They’re looking for novel ways to try to balance that correlation of forces… So they’re looking at nuclear, cyber, and space.” Since Desert Storm in 1991, Russia and China dissected US operations. Space superiority won wars. Now they build counters.
Russia’s Nuclear Shadow Looms Larger
Nuclear ASAT tops the list of horrors. The 2026 USSPACECOM Posture Statement, released in March, calls it the single greatest space threat: a weapon for orbital placement, violating the 1967 Outer Space Treaty. One blast floods low-Earth orbit with radiation. Thousands of satellites die—military, Starlink, commercial. LEO turns unusable for years.
Whiting reiterated concerns recently. “Russia remains a very historic and sophisticated space power… they continue to invest in counter-space weapons, with the most concerning reports being that they are potentially thinking about placing on orbit a nuclear ASAT weapon,” he told Fox News. Everyday life hangs in balance. Smartphones ping GPS dozens of times daily. Jamming already endangers airliners over Europe.
Ukraine sharpened the edge. Starlink proved resilient. US missile-defense constellations loom. Adversaries see bloated targets. Russia jammed, cyber-attacked space links, but held back direct hits. “Russia could have directly attacked in space… But they would rather attack us in cyber because it’s easier for them, cheaper for them, and harder for us to attribute,” Whiting noted.
Preparations ramp up. Last month’s Apollo Insight wargame—the first—gamed a Russian nuclear blast. Over 60 companies, allies like the UK and Australia, US agencies joined. Whiting: “We just concluded our first exercise last month… focused on weapons of mass destruction on orbit—a development we do not want to see come to fruition, but reporting about Russia’s plans… has forced us to prepare.” Defense One reported the fallout scenarios: immediate kills in the blast’s line of sight, lingering radiation frying survivors.
China mirrors the play. “The Chinese have studied us deeply for 35 years, and really, they’re trying to replicate what we have done,” Whiting said. Reconnaissance. Inspectors. GPS jammers. Strike sats. Both powers demonstrated ground ASATs—US included, back in 1985. India too. But co-orbital and nuclear push boundaries.
The Department of the Air Force’s Future Operating Environment to 2040 projects escalation. Russia deploys co-orbital RPO systems for reversible-to-destructive effects. Sleeper satellites. Mobile jammers. Gremlins sidling up to targets. By 2040, asymmetric attacks sow chaos while US eyes the Pacific.
US edges toward resilience. Proliferated constellations. Rapid replacement. Non-kinetic defenses. But vulnerabilities persist. A single nesting doll could blind reconnaissance. A nuclear pulse, global blackout.
Vigilance holds—for now. Whiting’s team watches every twitch. Russia knows it. So does the world orbiting below.
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