Will our next war be fought among the stars?

Sitting at the controls of a Boeing space-flight simulator, “docking” the company’s planned “Starliner” craft with an imaginary space station, you begin to understand why the Pentagon is so focused on such advanced systems.

Space is the new frontier of warfare. That was the theme of a “Space Symposium” here this week that gathered thousands of military and corporate experts from around the globe. A variant of the Boeing simulator may someday be training the 21st-century version of space-drone pilots.

The future battle may be in the heavens. But you can already see some sparring on the ground over who should control U.S. space-war-fighting capability — with the White House, Congress and the military services debating how best to allocate hundreds of billions of dollars and scores of senior Pentagon command positions. But let’s start with the threat, as described by U.S. military officials here.

Read the full article at The Washington Post