NZ defence strategy explores space weapons export potential

Analysis: New Zealand has put space front and centre of its defence industrial strategy at the same time that US space weapons are in record demand from other countries.

Space and drones are the government's top two priorities, but rounding out the top three is 'sustainment' - strengthening supply chains and maintenance options far from home, which are also key priorities at the Pentagon.

The strategy emphasises strengthening local companies and extending that to encompass Australia, which it mentions 45 times in its 44 pages, but it also accepts the tap needs to remain firmly turned on from America.

"The United States Foreign Military Sales Program (FMS) will continue to be an important source of military equipment and sustainment."

Join the queue. After experiencing a sixfold increase in demand from foreign militaries between 2023-24, US Space Systems Command said that, this year, requests had doubled to number 80 in total, according to US defence media reporting.

Total foreign space sales were expected to hit $20 billion before 2030 - or even more, if a new overhaul of the FMS succeeds.

As demand grows, the type of weapons proliferates into at least half-a-dozen, including 'kinetic' lasers, electromagnetic jammers and satellites with grappling hooks.

'New Zealand can genuinely compete'

Space Systems Command told reporters the FMS system was slowing sales down, "causing allies to opt for commercially available, in-country systems rather than wait for US cases to be approved and processed", according to Air and Space Forces magazine.

Does New Zealand have that option of 'in-country' supply, if it cannot get its hands on US space systems, even by dangling the $600m that might be spent this way by 2029?

Would local gear be up to the demands of a rapidly changing high-tech military landscape? The industrial strategists think so.

"Importantly, a critical enabler of all three priorities - in particular space capabilities, and uncrewed systems and counter systems - is New Zealand's advanced manufacturing and machining sectors," the strategy said.

Defence and Space Minister Judith Collins thinks so too, without room for doubt:

She has dismissed reservations about helping advance a global proliferation of tech weapons - such as from the Greens' Teanau Toiono in a series of parliamentary questions about satellite launches, and from protesters outside the national aerospace this week - as "bonkers" and said their proponents "live in another world".

Collins declined an interview request from RNZ about the defence industrial strategy. Her office said she was "unavailable".

A speech she gave behind closed doors to the local defence industry, numbering about 800 companies, in May helped shed some light on where New Zealand might head and whose lead it might follow.

"Whilst still to be determined, the centre of gravity could lie in the areas where New Zealand can genuinely compete, such as space, autonomous systems and sensors, which are also areas that have dual-use applications and, by association, large international markets," Collins' speech notes said.

By last week, that had firmed up into the top three priorities in the industrial strategy.

'The sensor is doing the work'

On that count, it cannot but help that US Space Systems Command is responding to the growing international interest "in a range of satellites and sensors" by "looking to make US systems available to allies and partners", as Air and Space Forces magazine reported.

'Sensors' in space are a huge, developing business.

Typically on satellites, sensors can be used to detect missile launches or track targets in what the US calls "kill chains".

The NZ Defence Force has begun playing a regular part in "kill chain" multinational exercises. Joining up allied command-and-control across a mega-network bristling with sensors, called CJADC2, is among the Pentagon's very top priorities.

It also helps that US-NZ company Rocket Lab has added recently to its ability to supply space-based missile warning sensors - tempered by the fact that much of its manufacturing is now in the States.

"Basically, you only build a satellite to host the sensor," Sir Peter Beck was quoted by Fastcompany last month. "The sensor is doing the work and you only launch a satellite, because you need to put the sensor in orbit."

Ground-based networks are also part of the sensor-satelllite-weapon or counterweapon chain.

Legislation to protect ground-based space systems in New Zealand from foreign interference was rushed through parliament in July.

The latest push is the government putting $104m into ground-based satellite technologies and servers for new military-grade radio systems - what Collins called "warfighting equipment" - that would improve how NZ troops worked with coalition partners.

Partner up

The strategic push is also towards partnering up on military development, production and maintenance between the Five Eyes partners - NZ, the US, Australia, Canada and the UK - and further afield in the Indo-Pacific to the likes of Korea and Japan. The new NZ strategy depends alot on partnering.

In space, of those five, only New Zealand and the US have space launch capability. The pair also have an unusual technology safeguards agreement to share America's high tech, put in place a decade ago to help enable Rocket Lab to launch.

However, when RNZ asked for a record of any talks about space-launch partnering with the US - including in June, when its top military space commander visited Auckland - the Defence Force said: "The NZDF holds no relevant information regarding the talks and report to which you refer.

"MoD [Defence Ministry] confirmed no relevant information is held."

As to the second of the Top Three industrial strategy priorities - drones - the NZDF told RNZ in August it did not have any strategy for drone development, nor any centralised system of drone procurement or training.

These gaps aside, the strategy picks up on two ways to try to quickly gym-up local defence muscle. Collins has promised a "sandbox" of streamlined rules and commercial access to NZDF testing facilities by year-end and, like in the UK and Australia, the NZDF will switch to what is called a "minimum viable capability" approach.

This is where a system is built quickly and in close consult with industry, where near-enough is good-enough.

"The problem minimum viable capability and minimum deployable capability are intended to fix is the practice of seeking the perfect, often bespoke solution, over what is good enough," the strategy said.

Sell to others

Military space supplies from the US could drop, giving local firms more chance to fill the gap, but the NZDF's demand alone would never be enough, even as budgets put more and more in, Collins told the defence industry in May.

"While the lift in government spending on defence over the next four years and out to 2040 is significant, few companies will be able to survive on NZDF revenue alone," Collins told them.

The answer - melding military and civilian output at the hip into what is called dual-use - and going out and selling arms to the world.

"Growing a resilient New Zealand defence industrial base requires us selling into other defence force supply chains," she said.

"Defence will work with industry to create new offshore markets, and new opportunities for Kiwi innovators and businesses, including in the Australian defence market, where we have a commitment on both sides of the Tasman to support industry integration and reduce any barriers of entry."

Collins' ideal future is NZ Inc welcoming customers for dual-use civilian-military high-tech applications that have "large international markets".

Taxpayers already know how much they will spend on defence capabilities this decade - $12 billion at least - but how much might NZ Inc earn?

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