[Global Times Special Correspondent, Chenyang, Global Times, Ma Jun]
As the relationship between Elon Musk, founder of SpaceX, and the Trump administration deteriorated, various official orders received by the company have also been “problematic” one after another. According to recent statistics from American media, the Pentagon has temporarily halted several military space programs, most of which are related to SpaceX. However, a Chinese expert interviewed by the Global Times on the 8th stated that SpaceX currently plays an irreplaceable role in the U.S. military aerospace field. Although the U.S. military is actively seeking alternatives, it may still be difficult to completely cut off SpaceX in the short term.
The “One-Hour Global Cargo” Project was Halted
According to the Stars and Stripes newspaper in the United States, the U.S. military announced on the 4th the suspension of the hypersonic rocket cargo test project with SpaceX due to strong opposition from environmental organizations against building a test base at Johnston Atoll in the Pacific Ocean.
Back in the 1960s, the Pentagon had proposed the idea of placing hundreds of U.S. soldiers inside a specially designed sealed capsule, using a giant carrier rocket to quickly send them to areas thousands of kilometers away. Theoretically, launching from the U.S. mainland, they could reach destinations in Asia, Europe, or Africa within one hour. However, this concept was only theoretically feasible because of its immaturity, especially the lack of suitable giant rockets. It wasn’t until SpaceX proposed the concept of the “Starship” super-heavy-lift rocket that the U.S. military’s rocket cargo project was revitalized. It can be said that this fast transportation plan, which the U.S. military had high hopes for, was inseparably linked from the beginning with SpaceX.
The “Power” website’s “Warzone” channel introduced that in 2020, the U.S. Air Force proposed what was called a “point-to-point” global rapid cargo transportation plan, which uses the carrying capacity of large commercial rockets to rapidly transport goods to any designated location worldwide within hours.
According to the United States Air Force, current military transportation methods require planning spanning several days to weeks to deliver supplies to distant locations at the right time. By contrast, using rocket transportation can shorten this process to just a few hours. Especially during high-risk transportation missions, conventional transport aircraft are slow and low in altitude, making them more susceptible to being shot down by adversaries. In contrast, transport rockets that fly at high speeds from space pose greater challenges for interception.
The U.S. military had previously collaborated with SpaceX to explore plans for rapid cargo delivery through the “Starship.” At that time, Stephen Lyons, the commander of the U.S. Army’s Transportation Command, stated that the Pentagon aimed to use large commercial rockets to transport goods equivalent to C-17 cargo capacity (approximately 85.5 tons) “in one hour to anywhere in the world.” According to SpaceX, the super-heavy rocket is composed of a super-heavy rocket and a Starship spacecraft, both of which can be reused, maximizing cost savings. It has a maximum near-Earth orbital payload capacity of 100 tons, meeting the U.S. military’s requirements for rapid rocket transportation. In June 2021, the Pentagon initiated the “Rocket Cargo Pioneer” experimental military project, researching aspects such as “landing rockets on non-traditional surfaces,” “designing rocket carriages capable of fast loading and unloading,” and “using rocket ships to drop off cargo.” Early 2022, the U.S. Air Force further awarded SpaceX a five-year contract worth $102 million, requiring data collection from the “Starship” program to test the technical feasibility of “point-to-point” cargo and humanitarian rapid transportation.
However, this project, so highly anticipated by the U.S. military, was halted due to environmental organizations opposing the construction of a rocket launch site on Johnston Atoll, raising questions.
The spokesperson for the U.S. Air Force stated that they are considering other locations as test sites for the project. However, prior to this, the U.S. military had already inspected several other locations on the Pacific, including Kuala Lumpur Reef, Midway Island, and Wake Island, ultimately choosing Johnston Reef because it was the only site that met all operational standards: remote, safe, under U.S. control, accessible by air or sea, and capable of supporting reentry vehicle transportation via barges.
Since the 1930s, despite long-standing opposition from environmental organizations, Johnston Reef has been a central hub for U.S. military nuclear testing, missile defense, chemical weapon storage, and even anti-satellite weapons tests. In fact, the constraints imposed by environmental groups have not always been effective. For instance, both marine biologists and environmentalists have pointed out that the high-powered low-frequency active sonar used by U.S. Navy ships can harm marine creatures such as dolphins and whales that rely on sound for navigation, hunting, and communication. The U.S. Navy is firmly opposed to abandoning the use of sonar for submarine detection. Public opinion in the U.S. has generally noted that the halting of the SpaceX rocket cargo project coincided with Elon Musk’s announcement of the “American Party” on the same day.
Is Elon Musk’s involvement in “Golden穹” in jeopardy?
Meanwhile, the future status of SpaceX within Trump’s proposed “Golden穹” missile defense system remains uncertain. In recent years, SpaceX’s “Starlink” and “Starship” large satellite constellations have gained favor from the Pentagon, securing nearly all of the U.S. Space Force’s commercial satellite communications contracts. This monopolistic situation has caused discontent among Congress, which could adversely affect SpaceX’s subsequent participation in U.S. military satellite projects.
According to U.S. media reports, insiders have disclosed that earlier in June, the White House instructed the Pentagon and NASA to gather detailed information on SpaceX’s multi-billion dollar contract. This move was a response to the public conflict between Trump and Musk.
The “Air Force & Space Force Magazine” revealed on June 30th that the $175 billion “Golden Dome” missile defense system will include a complex space satellite system. According to the Defense Space Development Agency (SDA) plan, the U.S. military will achieve hyper-range targeting of ground and seatime sensitive targets based on the National Defense Space Architecture, as well as early warning and tracking of hypersonic missiles. These are composed of hundreds of satellites deployed in low Earth orbit to provide functions such as military communication, navigation and positioning, and early warning tracking. The “transmission layer” satellite constellation, consisting of 450 satellites, is at the core of SDA’s “Joint All-Domain Command and Control” concept, capable of transmitting data rapidly from reconnaissance satellites to interception systems at low latency, achieving long-range tracking and interception of high-speed missiles in the atmosphere. It has been reported that the first batch of 27 “transmission layer” demonstration satellites has been launched, with plans to start the second batch of 126 satellites later this year, including Lockheed Martin Corporation, Northrop Grumman Corporation, York Space Systems Corporation, and American Rocket Labs.
However, what deeply concerns the U.S. Congress is that the development funding for the third batch of satellites, which possesses multiple important functions, has been halted. Chris Coons, the lead member of the Senate Appropriations Committee’s Defense Subcommittee, directly criticized during the Air Force’s budget hearing for the 2026 fiscal year, stating that this action is the result of SpaceX’s monopoly: “According to the budget proposal for the 2026 fiscal year, we learned that the Department of Defense will suspend the third ‘transmission layer’ satellite constellation program.”
The program is now replaced by a secret project named MILNET—directly designated by SpaceX to be constructed.
Kuenssle questions the lack of competitive mechanisms in the MILNET project, its non-open architecture, and the potential for the Pentagon’s future to be constrained by SpaceX’s proprietary technology. In response to various accusations, a spokesperson for the U.S. Air Force Department promised that MILNET would adopt a “plug-and-play” architecture design to ensure it does not rely on a single supplier, SpaceX. Additionally, American media specifically mentioned that the current U.S. Air Force Secretary, Meinke, had a close working relationship with Musk during his tenure as the Deputy Director of the National Reconnaissance Office, and was considered to have “biased” against SpaceX in the bidding process for billions of dollars in contracts. These negative news reports were quite unfavorable for SpaceX’s subsequent acquisition of more U.S. military satellite contracts.
SpaceX’s last year’s launch volume accounted for eighty percent of the United States’ space launches.
A Chinese expert interviewed by Global Times stated that although the Pentagon may have intended to part ways with SpaceX, reality shows that both parties cannot completely separate in the short term. Currently, SpaceX, with its high reliability and cost-effectiveness advantages, has taken over most of the U.S. space launch tasks, whether it’s the confidential satellites of the National Reconnaissance Office or the X-37B spacecraft of the U.S. Space Force, which are essentially undertaken by SpaceX. Statistics show that in 2024, SpaceX completed 138 space launches throughout the year, accounting for 87% of the total number of U.S. space launches (158), including a large number of government and military orders from the U.S. government, indicating its dominant position.
The Washington Post previously mentioned that after Trump and Musk “turned their backs,” Trump threatened to cancel the government contracts awarded to SpaceX.
However, SpaceX’s competitors are lagging behind in their progress, leaving the company’s dominance in aerospace launches largely unchallenged. The U.S. government has few options.
Despite attempts by the U.S. military to find alternatives to SpaceX, the capabilities of existing American commercial space launch companies are evidently lacking. For instance, Rocket Labs’ “Electron” rocket has limited carrying capacity, capable only of launching small satellites; Blue Origin’s “New Glenn” heavy-lift rocket is indeed powerful enough, but it was only completed its first launch in January this year, and large-scale commercial applications still require time; traditional aerospace launch giants—United Launch Alliance—have a considerable gap in terms of frequency and price compared to SpaceX’s “Falcon 9,” even experiencing a situation where the U.S. Space Force had to transfer GPS satellite launch orders to “Falcon 9” due to overburdened “New Glenn” rocket missions in April.
Beyond its absolute advantage in the commercial launch market, SpaceX’s “Starlink” internet satellite system also enjoys a head start and has been tested in real combat situations during the Russia-Ukraine conflict. Currently, the U.S. military’s available alternative is Amazon’s “Kuiper Project” satellite constellation, which aims to provide a global communication network with 3,236 low-orbit satellites. However, this project is still in its early stages, and future large-scale launches depend on the progress of “New Glenn” and “New Shepard” rockets, making the situation highly uncertain.