As the Space Force launched the final satellite in the current GPS III series, Congress is pressing the service to accelerate upgrades to better counter growing jamming and spoofing threats, according to Theresa Hitchens of BreakingDefense. The recent launch of GPS III SV09 aboard a SpaceX Falcon 9 marks continued progress, with the last GPS III satellite expected in March, but lawmakers remain frustrated with delays to next-generation GPS IIIF procurement and the cancellation of the Resilient-GPS program.
While GPS IIIF promises major gains in anti-jamming capability and resilience, appropriators argue the Space Force’s pace and funding decisions risk weakening a mission-critical system, prompting Congress to add funding, demand a comprehensive resilience plan, and reaffirm GPS as a core national and military priority. Hitchens writes:
As the Space Force nears launch of the final satellite in the current GPS III configuration for its venerable Global Positioning System constellation, congressional budgetmeisters are pushing the service to speed up improvements and launch new satellites that can better withstand growing adversary jamming and spoofing threats.
After two days of weather-related delays, the ninth, and penultimate, GPS III bird launched Tuesday night at 11:53 pm EST on a SpaceX Falcon 9. […]
Despite the steady progress in GPS updates, lawmakers on both sides of Capitol Hill fret that the current Defense Department and Space Force strategy for improving GPS and finding alternate systems to ensure the availability position, navigation and timing (PNT) signals for use by US military forces, and civilians, is not moving far enough fast enough. […]
The appropriators further chided the Defense Department for failing to take “significant actions to address the findings and recommendations” of a classified May 2024 study by the Defense Science Board completed in May 2024 that “highlights many, but not all, the issues that must be addressed to make PNT services more resilient, such as accelerating the delivery of jam resistant user equipment and increasing resilience of the ground control segment.” […]
…lawmakers instruct Secretary of the Air Force Troy Meink “to prioritize this program in the fiscal year 2027 President’s budget request and not use it to pay for other projects as the GPS mission is a core responsibility of the Space Force and essential to military operations as well as civil and commercial activity.”
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