# U.S. Space Force The **United States Space Force**, established in December 2019, is the space-warfare service of the [[Armed Forces Hub]] — the first new independent armed service since 1947. It sits within the [[Department of the Air Force]] alongside the [[U.S. Air Force]], under the same civilian Secretary ([[Troy Meink]]). Its uniformed head is the Chief of Space Operations, a position held from 2022 by Gen. [[Chance Saltzman]], who departed in 2026. Its members are called Guardians; it is by far the smallest service, which makes its budget-to-headcount ratio unlike anything else in the Pentagon. Its operational arms include [[Space Systems Command]], which runs acquisition and awards [[National Security Space Launch]] contracts. ## Why the Space Force matters to this vault **It is the most contractor-dependent service in the U.S. military.** A service this small does not build things; it buys them. Launch, satellites, ground systems, and increasingly the operational capability itself come from commercial providers — which puts an unusually large share of national-security space capability inside a small number of private firms, with [[SpaceX]] the most consequential. The vault's commercial-space leverage thread runs directly through here, and it is the same dependence visible at [[NASA]], on the defence side of the ledger. The FY2026 defense appropriations bill funded the Space Force at roughly **$26 billion**. ## Golden Dome [[Golden Dome]] is the administration's layered missile-defence architecture and the service's defining program. The relevant facts, and the relevant gaps: - The White House estimates **$175 billion over three years**. Congress provided about **$23 billion** in the FY2026 defense bill via a reconciliation deal. - Gen. [[Michael Guetlein]] directs the program. The Pentagon targets an initial capability demonstration in **2028**. - The Space Development Agency's low-Earth-orbit missile-tracking satellites carry roughly **$1.7 billion**. - Space-based interceptors — the element that makes the concept novel rather than incremental — are **not guaranteed**; Guetlein has publicly signalled the Pentagon is still weighing cost. The oversight problem is the part worth flagging. **There is no single budget line for Golden Dome.** House and Senate appropriators stated they were "unable to effectively assess resources available to specific program elements" because cost, schedule, performance metrics and the finalised architecture were not provided, and directed Defense Secretary [[Pete Hegseth]] to deliver a comprehensive spending plan covering FY2025–27. A program of this size distributed across program elements without a consolidated line is difficult to oversee by design or by accident — and either way it is the condition under which [[Power of the Purse]] stops functioning as a check. ## See Also - [[Department of the Air Force]] · [[Armed Forces Hub]] · [[U.S. Air Force]] - [[Golden Dome]] · [[Michael Guetlein]] · [[Chance Saltzman]] · [[Troy Meink]] - [[Space Systems Command]] · [[National Security Space Launch]] · [[SpaceX]] - [[Power of the Purse]] · [[Defense Primes Sector]] - [[Federal Agencies]] - [[Space as a Warfighting Domain]] — the doctrine of orbit as a battlefield, from Space Force to Golden Dome - [[Anti-Satellite Weapons]] — the 2007, 2019 and 2021 ASAT tests and the debris dilemma