Space, Speed, and Sovereignty: Hypersonic Tensions in the Southern Hemisphere
Summary
China's growing space presence and military influence in Latin America and the Caribbean is causing concern for the U.S. Pentagon. Here are the key points:- China has established a network of space ground control sites across South America, including tracking, telemetry, and command (TT&C) stations that are crucial for communicating with and controlling spacecraft and tracking fast-moving objects like hypersonic glide vehicles (HGVs).
- Specific installations mentioned include the China-Argentina Radio Telescope in Argentina, Espacio Lejano in Neuquén, Argentina, and approximately three known Chinese TT&C sites in the Southern Cone.
- China boasts the largest number of space facilities in the region outside its own territory, with over 11 Chinese space facilities across five Latin American countries.
- The fallout of Russia's invasion of Ukraine continues to reverberate in Latin America and the Caribbean. The U.S. is concerned about China's growing military presence in the region, as it often leverages seemingly innocuous commercial interests for military purposes.
- China's military-to-military relations within Latin America and the Caribbean have been strengthening in recent decades, with senior PLA leaders conducting more than 200 visits to the region to meet their counterparts.
- China has sold arms, aircraft, tanks, and other military equipment to several Latin American and Caribbean countries, and has helped its partners develop space satellites and ground control architecture.
- The Pentagon is concerned that China's growing network of facilities in Latin America and Antarctica for its civilian space and satellite programs has defense capabilities, potentially expanding Beijing's global military surveillance network.
- China's international space facilities are still far outnumbered by U.S. stations, but they are part of a growing Chinese global space infrastructure forged mostly in countries with close diplomatic ties to Beijing.
- The technology behind China's space program in Latin America and Antarctica is dominated by state-owned enterprises with close ties to the military.
Installations
China has established a network of space ground control sites across South America, which include tracking, telemetry, and command (TT&C) stations. These installations are crucial for communicating with and controlling spacecraft, as well as tracking fast-moving objects like hypersonic glide vehicles (HGVs).
Specific installations mentioned in the article:
1. China-Argentina Radio Telescope in Argentina, slated for completion in May 2024. While ostensibly aimed at scientific exploration, its dual-use nature raises concerns about potential military applications.
2. Espacio Lejano in Neuquén, Argentina, operated by entities directly linked to the PLA's Strategic Support Force. This facility has been the subject of recent inspections by the Argentinian government to ensure transparency and compliance with existing agreements.
3. Approximately three known Chinese TT&C sites in the Southern Cone: two in Argentina and one in Chile. The exact locations of these sites are not specified in the article.
The article also mentions that China boasts the largest number of space facilities in the region outside its own territory, with over 11 Chinese space facilities across five Latin American countries, as highlighted by General Laura Richardson, the commander of the U.S. Southern Command.
Space, Speed, and Sovereignty: Hypersonic Tensions in the Southern Hemisphere
The evolution of hypersonic missile technology marks a significant shift in the global strategic landscape, with a recent U.S. congressional hearing highlighting the swift advances made by nations such as China and Russia. This technological leap into a new era of warfare is characterized by its potential to disrupt existing power balances and introduce strategic ambiguities.
The shifting dynamics of global power are particularly evident in the Southern Cone, where a unique geographic advantage coupled with limited space infrastructure has long drawn space powers seeking to fill technological gaps. South American countries have leveraged these circumstances to develop their national space programs by fostering partnerships that emphasize technology transfer and investment. Even as these domestic initiatives reach new achievements, the presence of foreign partner-operated space infrastructure, notably from China, has grown significantly. In fact, China boasts the largest number of space facilities in the region outside its own territory. This robust investment raises questions about China’s motives, suggesting that its strategic expansion into the Southern Cone is both an extension of its technological prowess and a tactical move to extend its military reach closer to U.S. boundaries.
In recent years the United States has been vocal in raising concerns about these developments, linked to the so-called pacing threat of China. General Laura Richardson, the commander of the U.S. Southern Command, recently highlighted the existence of over 11 Chinese space facilities across five Latin American countries. Managed directly and indirectly by organizations with ties to the People’s Liberation Army (PLA), these sites straddle the line between civilian use and military applications. On top of U.S. security unease, these inherently dual-use capabilities stir national sovereignty and security concerns, especially in a region with limited technical and space governance. In this context, vulnerabilities in strategic areas like space may hamper the ability of South American nations to maintain consistent policy positions—and highly prized neutrality—especially in times of great power conflict.
Space-Enabling Infrastructure: Dual-Use and Decisive
Ground stations are a crucial part of space infrastructure. At the core, they provide terrestrial communications links to satellites in orbit and enable the ability to track and command spacecraft. Because of their role in the data transmission flow, they are essential in functions like cybersecurity. Operators also use ground stations to train personnel on satellite maneuvers, tasking, and data processing. Like satellites themselves, the antennas, receivers, and related infrastructure are inherently dual-use, and any ground station can be a first link to civil, commercial, and defense applications. Strategically positioned in the pursuit of continuous communication with spacecraft, ground stations in the Southern Hemisphere—where space infrastructure has proliferated more slowly—have been particularly sought after.
While ostensibly aimed at advancing scientific exploration, as is the case with the China-Argentina Radio Telescope slated for completion in May 2024, the inherent dual-use nature of China’s growing network of space ground control sites in South America raises strategic implications. A key concern is the potential to significantly influence the operational command of hypersonic missiles. Notably, the tracking, telemetry, and command (TT&C) stations can play a crucial role in enabling the precise maneuvering of hypersonic glide vehicles (HGVs), which blend the speed of ballistic missiles with the maneuverability of cruise missiles. China’s footprint augments its command, control, computing, communications, cyber, intelligence, surveillance, reconnaissance and targeting (C5ISRT) network for deploying precision-strike weapon systems. Demonstrating its hypersonic advancements, China’s 2021 test around the world involved the launch of an intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM), releasing an HGV. This test marked a first in a method of deployment that involves a fast-moving HGV to place warheads into low Earth orbit that can be directed to strike a designated target. The HGV flew approximately 40,000 km over 100 minutes, a watershed moment according to U.S. military experts. The dual threats posed by these weapons, whether nuclear or conventional, combined with existing TT&C facilities, raise pressing questions about the implications for international and regional security.
The Geopolitical Quagmire
Security Concerns
U.S. national security leaders and analysts have drawn attention to the potential for foreign partner–operated stations to support offensive military operations, including hypersonic weaponry command and control. China’s South American–based space object surveillance and identification installations, suspected to be used to enable foreign knowledge of U.S. space operations, have been a focal point. These facilities, equipped with sophisticated optical and radio telescopes, are perceived as a formidable threat to U.S. space-based assets. They are considered crucial for space situational awareness, enabling the monitoring, tracking, and prediction of the future positions of U.S. satellites. This capability gives the PRC the potential to calculate and possibly launch anti-satellite weapon systems when these satellites are over the Eastern Hemisphere.
A critical yet underappreciated aspect of these facilities, however, is their role in China’s expanding network of TT&C stations. These facilities, instrumental in facilitating communications and issuing commands to spacecraft, are a critical component of the PLA’s C5ISRT capabilities for both satellite operations and the tracking and control of swift-moving objects like HGVs. China’s C5ISRT modernization is critical to its precision strike doctrine, and TT&C facilities in South America may be a vital component of its warfighting capabilities. U.S. security interests are focused on limiting China’s growth in C5ISRT; in a recent congressional hearing, the incoming commander of the Indo-Pacific Command, Admiral Samuel Paparo, highlighted that at the onset of a potential war with China, C5ISRT in the nontraditional warfighting domains of space and cyber will either support U.S. Joint Force efforts to prevail or become China’s Achilles’ heel.
Strategically positioned across South America, TT&C stations offer China critical support for the potential deployment and guidance of hypersonic missiles over the Western Hemisphere, with the United States a likely target. Some U.S. experts are particularly alarmed given Chinese successes in hypersonic missile technology and the lack of defenses in the southern portion of the country.
China's strategic development of a comprehensive global TT&C network, incorporating stationary, mobile, and maritime assets, showcases its commitment to maintaining an unbroken chain of command over its space assets. This network's expansion, which also includes facilities in Africa, is crucial for China to achieve a commanding presence in space operations and control across the globe.
Opacity and Limited Oversight
International facilities affiliated with China are characterized by limited access and oversight from host countries, raising concerns over potential military applications disguised under the pretense of scientific and commercial endeavors. This opacity is a matter of national security for those nations who are often unaware of the risks posed to their sovereignty.
The PRC’s military access is not merely confined to scientific exploration, as it exemplifies a broader strategy of China’s military-civil fusion. This symbiosis blurs the line between civilian and military technologies, leveraging advancements in one to bolster the capabilities of the other. The presence of ground stations like Espacio Lejano in Neuquén, Argentina, operated by entities directly linked to the PLA’s Strategic Support Force, underscores the strategic ambiguity and potential for these sites to serve PLA military objectives far beyond their stated civilian purposes.
While the Neuquén station captures significant attention, China’s space-related engagements expand into commercial, academic, and scientific realms. To date, there are approximately three known PRC TT&C sites in the Southern Cone, two in Argentina and one in Chile. The indistinct lines between the Chinese Communist Party's espionage activities and its ostensibly innocuous initiatives are even more pronounced in China’s 2015 national security law and its 2017 national intelligence law. These laws mandate a unified effort from all citizens and organizations to support intelligence operations, underscoring the inseparable nature of China's state and civilian sectors in espionage activities.
Highlighting broader fears about the militarization of civilian space assets, in 2020 the Swedish Space Corporation severed ties with the PRC due to dual-use concerns (though the sites will continue to operate until their contracts expire). The corporation cited a changing geopolitical scene, difficulties distinguishing between civilian and military uses of its antennas, as well as links to the China Launch and Tracking Control General, an entity of the PLA’s Strategic Support Force.
In the lead-up to the 2023 elections, Argentinian presidential hopeful Javier Milei was vocal about his disdain for China and commitment to closer integration with the United States and Western allies. Since assuming office, President Milei has toned down his rhetoric but has maintained interest in accountability, with a particular focus on the PLA-operated Neuquén station. The provincial government where the station sits backed the executive’s intention to conduct inspections to ensure “maximum transparency” and compliance with existing agreements. Preliminary results of the April 2024 official inspection revealed no irregularities and no indication of military activities. However, Argentina intends on maintaining further oversight over the facility.
The inspection of Espacio Lejano was seen as indicative of the region’s pushback to China’s overreach, similar to sovereignty concerns that have been raised with respect to other major powers. Notably, the inspection team went on to examine another partner facility managed by the European Union. Regular, comprehensive inspections of foreign partner–operated facilities could reflect a positive trend toward protecting national sovereignty in future efforts.
Patchwork Space Governance
Across the emerging space economies in the region, civil, commercial, and defense issues are tackled largely independently, and significant gaps exist across these communities. This shows up as a marked disconnect between technical capabilities and the patchwork of policies, laws, and regulations to manage and protect them. The resulting dependencies on third parties, lack of awareness of implications of decisions made independently, and limited measures to address security vulnerabilities all restrict the autonomy of decisionmakers and may run counter to national priorities.
In a potential conflict scenario, the region’s growing network of ground stations operated by foreign partners—whether governmental or commercial—could be exploited to conduct offensive activities, irrespective of the intentions of their hosts or the stated use of the facility. This would lead to setbacks in regional efforts that prioritize advancing the economic benefits of space while upholding its peaceful use. It could also impair the ability of the host nation to maneuver or maintain neutrality in a conflict scenario with consequences in other strategic areas, especially with regard to sovereignty. The lack of maturity in the governance framework of space activities in this part of the world, described as the “most vulnerable” to cyberattacks, creates significant risks to space users across the region.
Charting a Path Forward
Considering the significant security challenges identified, the need exists for robust international cooperation and dialogue as well as a concerted effort to strengthen defense alliances, enhance technological innovation, and bolster space governance.
Expand Defense and Technological Collaboration
Recent targeted bilateral space security engagements with hemispheric partners should be expanded to include formal defense collaboration mechanisms. The cooperative defense framework established in AUKUS Pillar Two, a strategic alliance among Australia, the United Kingdom, and the United States dedicated to enhancing advanced military capabilities, offers a promising model. By inviting select South American nations, partners could harness a wider pool of expertise and resources aimed at accelerating the development and deployment of sophisticated technologies for detecting and neutralizing hypersonic threats, while also enhancing the security of critical space infrastructures. Argentina’s recent request to join the North Atlantic Treaty Organization as a global partner points to an appetite to access advanced technology and training. These kinds of mechanisms promote the sharing of critical knowledge and defensive strategies, thereby strengthening readiness against potential military exploitation of strategic assets and increasing the likelihood of a unified stance against shared threats.
Establish Technical Regulatory Dialogues
Technical discussions at bilateral and regional forums can facilitate the development of shared standards and best practices for the operation of ground stations. These standards should emphasize transparency, civilian oversight, and the implementation of space security and cybersecurity safeguards that align with broader national policies. These dialogues should happen at multiple levels to engage operators across the different domains. They should also enable bridges with the policy and regulatory decisionmakers involved in the approval and licensing process of these facilities, ensuring that governments implement adequate measures and protections to benefit end users.
Strengthen Governance
Nations in the region can leverage existing governance mechanisms to limit the vulnerabilities of dual-use capabilities. Cybersecurity measures will remain paramount in protecting space infrastructure from the risks of espionage and sabotage. Costa Rica’s strategy of restricting PRC-sponsored 5G network bids for companies whose countries have not signed on to the Budapest Convention on Cybercrime exemplifies a proactive approach. By using this convention as a benchmark, Costa Rica set a precedent for applying international standards to safeguard national interests. If more widely adopted, this alignment would not only foster a unified approach to cyber threats but also send a strong message about the region’s commitment to cybersecurity.
Regional leaders like Argentina, Brazil, and Chile should further integrate multilateral space discussions into existing and new regional forums—such as the space component of the Americas Partnership for Economic Prosperity or the recently established Latin American and Caribbean Space Agency—to meaningfully involve new space actors. Concrete opportunities include building on the strong regional weight of the signatories of the Artemis Accords, a U.S.-led framework to reaffirm principles for the peaceful use of space in the new era of space exploration. With Argentina, Brazil, Colombia, Ecuador, Mexico, and, most recently, Uruguay on board, the accords offer a strategic tool to develop implementation mechanisms that respond to the unique needs of the region and that strengthen coordination on national governance.
Conclusion
The revealing narrative of Chinese hypersonic missiles and their intricate connections with South American space ground control sites transcends the confines of space and hypersonic technology. It unfolds into a broader discourse on the complexities of sovereignty, technology, defense, and the multifaceted geopolitics of a region with a central role in global challenges as diverse as energy and food security. This situation presents both a challenge and an opportunity for key players in the Americas—in particular, the United States as it competes with China and seeks to lead on space governance—and South American nations that are shaping national and regional space efforts amid complex economic and political challenges. Even beyond U.S. security concerns related to these developments, already there are indications that countries in the region are pushing back on asymmetrical relationships that could impair their own strategic freedom of movement in the future.
Mitigating the risks associated with these dual-use facilities and the potential threats posed by hypersonic weapons requires deeper bilateral and regional cooperation. This cooperation should enhance mutual understanding of the risks and vulnerabilities tied to the nature of space-enabling infrastructure. Through regular, open exchange, countries can demystify the intentions behind the establishment of foreign partner–operated sites and work collaboratively to develop measures that prevent their exploitation for offensive military purposes. These deepening relationships must deliver concrete results such as strengthened defense alliances, technological development efforts, and enhanced national and regional governance measures. Ultimately, countries in the region can build not only on the alignment of values, but also on the alignment of established processes and procedures to advance shared principles: the peaceful use of space, space sustainability, and reducing the risk of conflict.
Guido L. Torres is the executive director of the Irregular Warfare Initiative and a nonresident senior fellow with the Atlantic Council’s Forward Defense Program. Laura Delgado López is a visiting fellow with the Americas Program at the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington, D.C., and a Council on Foreign Relations international affairs fellow.
China Leverages Commercial Projects to Expand Its Military Presence in Latin America and the Caribbean
The fallout of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine continues to reverberate around the world, including in Latin America and the Caribbean. During his meeting with Colombian President Iván Duque last week, U.S. President Joe Biden commended Colombia for condemning Russian President Vladimir Putin’s actions and announced that the United States would designate Colombia as a major non-NATO ally. This means one more Latin American partner in the fight to counter Russian global influence, especially as Russia strengthens its ties with authoritarian regimes in Venezuela, Cuba, and Nicaragua. But there is also a longer-term strategic threat facing the United States and its Latin American and Caribbean partners: China’s growing presence in the region and, in particular, its military presence.
Latin America experts often discuss Beijing’s trade and investment in the region, especially those projects run under its signature Belt and Road Initiative (BRI). Twenty-one Latin American and Caribbean countries have now joined the BRI, according to the Congressional Research Service, including Argentina, the most recent signatory and largest economy of the group. However, focusing predominantly on China’s economic and trade relationship to the region misses an alarming trend observed elsewhere in the world, which may well repeat itself in Latin America and the Caribbean: China often leverages seemingly innocuous commercial interests for military purposes.
The People’s Liberation Army (PLA) has been strengthening its military-to-military relations within Latin America and the Caribbean in recent decades. Since the early 2000s, senior PLA leaders have conducted more than 200 visits to the region to meet their counterparts. China has established a high-level defense forum with the Community of Latin American and Caribbean States (CELAC) and offers professional military education to Latin American and Caribbean military personnel. The PLA also sends its own military personnel to the region to receive special training in jungle warfare. China has sold arms, aircraft, tanks, and other military equipment to several Latin American and Caribbean countries, including Venezuela, Argentina, and Bolivia, and has helped its partners there develop space satellites and ground control architecture. The People’s Liberation Army Navy has also visited several ports in the region, some as close to the United States as Cuba.
This burgeoning military relationship will likely deepen as China seeks more ways to project its power globally. For instance, the 2022-2024 joint action plan between China and CELAC stipulates that the defense forum will continue to deepen cooperation in fighting transnational organized crime, nuclear proliferation, and violent extremism. Further, current trends in the region—such as Nicaragua’s recent switch of diplomatic relations from Taiwan to China and upcoming elections in key U.S. security partners Colombia and Brazil—where the left-leaning candidates currently lead the polls—augur well for deeper Chinese engagement.
As its influence in the region grows, China could use its military ties as bargaining chips to pressure the United States and its allies, perhaps threatening to send troops or increase personnel and equipment in countries close to the U.S. border. Even before Russia invaded Ukraine, Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov said Moscow could “neither confirm nor exclude” deploying troops and equipment to Venezuela and Cuba if tensions with the United States escalated over Ukraine. Just weeks ago, a Russian delegation led by Deputy Prime Minister Yuri Borisov visited Venezuela, Nicaragua, and Cuba, signing a series of cooperation agreements. Indeed, there is little to stop China from borrowing Russia’s playbook if tensions with the United States and its allies rise over Taiwan or the South China Sea. Russian doctrine has long linked its European policy with the need to counterbalance the United States in Latin America.
More covertly, two recent developments in the Middle East and Africa may serve as harbingers for Latin American and Caribbean countries in terms of how China’s economic ties to the region serve as a foray to develop its military capabilities there as well. China has allegedly attempted to build a clandestine military facility at a port in the United Arab Emirates and is reportedly seeking to construct a military base in Equatorial Guinea.
In recent years, China has become one of the UAE’s largest trading partners and the largest consumer of Gulf oil. It is no surprise, then, that the Chinese shipping conglomerate Cosco built and now operates a commercial container terminal in the port of Khalifa, about 50 miles north of Abu Dhabi, to facilitate these commercial ties. However, the Wall Street Journal reported last November that U.S. intelligence agencies had detected a large excavation site at the port, which they suspected of having military purposes. Apparently, the Emirati government was unaware of the military nature of the project, and construction of that facility has been halted for now. The UAE denied that there was any plan or agreement to host any kind of Chinese military installation, and the Chinese Embassy in Washington remained silent on the topic.
In December 2021, the Journal reported that China sought to establish its first permanent military presence on the Atlantic Ocean, most likely in Equatorial Guinea at the port of Bata, a deep-water commercial port on the Gulf of Guinea built and developed by two Chinese state-owned companies, the China Communications Construction Co. and the China Road and Bridge Corp. In congressional testimony in April 2021, Gen. Stephen Townsend, the head of U.S. Africa Command, stated that the “most significant threat” from China would be establishing a port on the Atlantic “where they can rearm with munitions and repair naval vessels.” Neither Equatorial Guinea’s oil minister nor its ambassador to the United States responded to the Journal’s inquiries.
These two events are part of a disturbing pattern, whereby China has attempted to expand infrastructure projects—some run under the BRI—beyond their original purpose. Chinese military officials, policymakers, and analysts will often shy away from the term “overseas military base” because it carries the historical baggage of European colonialism; rather, they use the term “strategic strong points” to ensure naval access and resupply. When the PLA established its first naval base in Djibouti in 2017, it called the base a “logistics facility,” and its stated intention was to conduct anti-piracy and peacekeeping operations. Yet the PLA is now building a large naval pier on that base that could potentially support an aircraft carrier. The PLA Navy could potentially use port projects in Pakistan and Sri Lanka for naval access, too.
On the other side of the Atlantic, in Latin America and the Caribbean, China has built the requisite commercial foundations to leverage a similar strategy. In the past two decades, Chinese companies have built or are planning to build 150 transportation infrastructure projects—and dozens of them have port facilities or expansion elements.
“These [projects] include seven port operations by PRC-based Hutchison Port Holdings in Mexico, three in Panama, three in the Bahamas and one in Buenos Aires, Argentina,” Evan Ellis, a professor at the U.S. Army War College, told the U.S.-China Economic and Security Review Commission last year. Additionally, Ellis said Chinese firms are also engaged in port construction projects in Brazil, Peru, Ecuador, and Jamaica and that “there is also potential for Chinese advances in ports in other areas,” including El Salvador, the Dominican Republic, and Guyana.
All of these port projects are situated around sea lines of communication and strategic choke points essential for global commerce and military operations, especially the port operations around the Panama Canal, the Caribbean, and a potential “polar logistics” facility in Ushuaia, Argentina, near the Strait of Magellan and the closest departure point to Antarctica. It is possible that these ports could be for “dual-use” purposes, meaning that the PLA Navy may request naval access in the near future.
If the U.S.-China strategic competition grows into a hotter conflict, China could also leverage these strategically located ports to disrupt U.S. commercial and naval access in the Western Hemisphere. In recent years, China has wielded its commercial might to retaliate against Australia for demanding an investigation into the origins of COVID-19, India for ongoing territorial disputes, and Lithuania for increasing ties with Taiwan. China’s economic ties to Latin America would permit it to easily replicate those same tactics in the Americas.
As sovereign nations, Latin American and Caribbean governments have the right to engage with any other country in a host of areas—commercial, military, and otherwise. Some may argue that China’s military engagement in the region—though a national security risk for the United States—is ultimately a boon for Latin American and Caribbean governments, which gain potentially cheaper options for military equipment and training than usually higher-quality but more expensive alternatives from the United States and Western allies. Countries may even seek to play the superpowers off each other, maximizing their own interests in trade, investment, and security. However, the danger lies in the lack of transparency of Chinese contracts. As in the UAE, governments are often unaware of the potential dual-use military capacity of the commercial projects they sign up for. This should serve as a lesson for Latin American and Caribbean governments to ensure that the deals they enter into with Chinese counterparts are devoid of hidden clauses that may unnecessarily jeopardize their country’s sovereignty.
But governments should also consider how increased military engagement with China might affect their long-standing partnerships with the United States and other Western countries. Most Latin American and Caribbean countries frequently work with the U.S. military to counter common regional threats, such as transnational criminal organizations, cyberattacks, and natural disasters linked to climate change. They also participate in a host of annual military exercises hosted by U.S. Southern Command (for which one of us, Leland Lazarus, works). Significant training exercises with the PLA or PLA Navy will make China more familiar with military doctrine in Latin American and Caribbean countries and could lead to increased interoperability of regional armed forces.
U.S. officials are also rightfully concerned that the PLA and Chinese government-backed hacking groups could use increased engagement with Latin American and Caribbean partners to spy on U.S. officials and steal sensitive U.S. military technology, plans, or tactics. In December 2021, a Chinese hacking group was accused of hacking and spying on 29 countries, 17 of them in the region. If, at some point, a Latin American and Caribbean country insists on engaging with Chinese military counterparts, the United States may be left with no choice but to limit its security cooperation with that country to protect its own national security and intellectual property.
For the United States, the best way to counter China’s growing commercial and military influence in the region is to double down on being its most trusted partner. That includes helping to build regional capacity and domestic institutions that can ward off the most corrosive elements of Chinese engagement; further developing infrastructure financing initiatives from the U.S. International Development Finance Corp.; strengthening security partnerships to compete with China’s efforts; and supporting regional arms industries and small defense industrial bases to provide alternatives to Chinese arms sales.
The United States, as well as its allies and partners, should implement these actions quickly in order to keep pace with China’s military engagement in the region. Indeed, China’s military engagement in other parts of the world provides a road map for where it could take similar engagement in Latin America. It’s only a matter of time before it does.
The views expressed in this piece are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the views of the U.S. government.
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China’s growing space program in Latin America concerns U.S. Pentagon
EL ALTO, Bolivia — On a plateau 13,000 feet above sea level in the Bolivian Andes, llama herders and Indigenous farmers share the sparse landscape with an unusual neighbor: a towering cluster of Chinese-built satellite dishes.
The Amachuma Ground Station exchanges data 24 hours a day with Bolivia’s only state-owned satellite, Tupac Katari I, which orbits some 22,300 miles above Latin America. The remote ground station has another, largely invisible, use: It allows Beijing to surveil skies 10,000 miles from China, according to officials from the Bolivian space agency and Chinese scientists and company officials familiar with the program.
China’s Global Leap
At every point of the compass, China is quietly laying the foundations of its new international order.
The Pentagon is increasingly concerned that China’s growing network of facilities in Latin America and Antarctica for its civilian space and satellite programs has defense capabilities. U.S. officials say the ground stations — which allow countries to maintain uninterrupted communication with satellites and other space vehicles — have the potential to expand Beijing’s global military surveillance network in the southern hemisphere and areas close to the United States.
China already has over 700 satellites in orbit, with plans to expand that number exponentially in the coming years — a project that requires a global constellation of terrestrial facilities to track and communicate with them as they pass over different parts of the planet.
Apart from two ground stations in Bolivia, opened in 2013, China built space facilities in Venezuela in 2008, Peru in 2015, Argentina in 2016 and has at least two stations under construction in Antarctica. It has additional access to facilities in Brazil and Chile through research partnerships. This infrastructure fills a key geographical gap for Beijing’s space program, allowing China to track and communicate with its growing fleet of satellites and space vehicles while also potentially surveilling other state’s assets as they pass over the southern hemisphere.
Ground stations are a critical piece of terrestrial space infrastructure, performing what is called telemetry, tracking and command (TT&C) functions, meaning they are able to track or communicate with the vast web of satellites and space vehicles that fill the sky. They are key to delivering commercial services, including internet connectivity, Earth imaging and the monitoring of civilian space research vehicles.
Ground stations can also play an important role in national security. They facilitate military communications, track missile launches, surveil the space assets of other countries and can play a role in jamming, interfering with or potentially destroying enemy satellites. The importance of satellite networks in war has been underscored since the Russian invasion of Ukraine, where communication satellites and terminals made by Starlink, the satellite internet company operated by Elon Musk’s SpaceX, have become a lifeline for Ukrainian forces.
China’s international space facilities are still far outnumbered by U.S. stations, but the Latin American and Antarctic sites are just one segment in a growing Chinese global space infrastructure, forged mostly in countries with close diplomatic ties to Beijing.
The Chinese state firm behind Bolivia’s ground stations has, since 2008, built similar projects in Laos, Pakistan, Nigeria and Belarus, while other space-tracking facilities linked to the People’s Liberation Army include sites in Namibia and Kenya. China also maintains a fleet of mobile space support ships that, according to the Pentagon, are used to track satellite and ICBM launches.
This summer, Chinese state media said national records were broken when 67 satellites were launched within just nine days in June. Earlier this year, Chinese military researchers said work has begun on launching a mega-constellation of almost 13,000 low-earth orbit satellites, designed to compete with Starlink, which has its own global constellation of ground stations.
“Their on-orbit armada of satellites can track us, can sense us, can see us … and can now hold U.S. forces at risk in a way we have never understood or had to face to date,” said Maj. Gen. Gregory J. Gagnon, deputy chief of space operations for intelligence at the U.S. Space Force, speaking at the Air and Space Forces Association Warfare symposium in March.
Gagnon said that around half of China’s 700 satellites are used for remote sensing and intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance purposes, meaning they are equipped to gather sensitive security data.
At the time of its launch in 2013, the Tupac Katari I satellite — named after a famed Bolivian revolutionary and funded by a $250 million China Development Bank loan — represented something unthinkable to many Bolivians: the prestige of a national space program, connectivity for the country’s remote rural communities and a specialized military communications bandwidth.
But almost 10 years later, the promise of Bolivia’s revolutionary leap into space has faded. While Tupac Katari I has driven more connectivity in remote areas, plans to use the project as a launchpad for the country’s own space industry have been scuttled by economic woes. Much of the Chinese loan remains outstanding, with Tupac Katari I set to be retired into a deep space graveyard within five years.
The ground stations have proved useful as one of several Latin American facilities accessible to China.
“We have rented it to the Chinese to control the launch of [their] other satellites,” said Iván Zambrana, director general of Agencia Boliviana Espacial, the Bolivian space agency, speaking from the expansive glass-fronted building that overlooks the dishes — a glitzy perk of the Chinese loan package.
Zambrana said that under the contracts, Chinese technicians travel to Bolivia about once a year to access the base, usually via a secondary ground station that communicates with Amachuma from the Bolivian city of Santa Cruz. From there, they are able to install technology and track other assets in space. One Chinese technician said Beijing is able to remotely access a number of the overseas stations, including those in Bolivia and Venezuela. “Those agreements were done with the permission of partner governments,” said the technician who, like others, spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss sensitive matters.
Beijing is not alone in building space TT&C facilities abroad, most of which have legitimate civilian uses, and the country maintains its ground stations in Latin America and Antarctica are used exclusively for peaceful purposes. What sets China’s international commercial space program apart is its close links to the military. The contractors behind China’s space technology — including most of the Latin American and Antarctic facilities — are also the leading state-owned powerhouses behind the missile development, cyberwarfare and counter space defense programs of the People’s Liberation Army.
“All of the [Chinese] agencies that are involved in the information and the data collection at these places are tied back in one way or the other to the Chinese government or to the Chinese military,” said Matthew Funaiole, a senior fellow at the Washington-based Center for Strategic and International Studies, who has studied the expansion of Chinese ground stations in Latin America and Antarctica.
“The way to think about it is, if these sites are or could collect data that is beneficial to the PLA, and the PLA wants it, it’s going to get it,” he said.
Beijing has set a goal to become a world-leading space power by 2045 — a program that lays out ambitious targets in national security as well as civilian projects, including a plan to send crewed spacecraft to the moon by 2030 and develop nuclear-powered space shuttles by 2040. Spearheading Beijing’s race toward space supremacy are a cluster of state-owned firms that are either direct units of the PLA or military contractors. Others are private or state enterprises that are part of Beijing’s military-civil fusion program, a national strategic policy drive by the Chinese Communist Party to enrich the military with civilian-developed technologies.
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The technology behind China’s space program — including the facilities in Latin America and Antarctica — is dominated by two state-owned enterprises: the China Aerospace Science and Technology Corp. (CASC) and China Aerospace Science and Industry Corp. (CASIC). Both firms originated in the PLA, before being spun off into major state-owned enterprises, and remain top suppliers to the country’s military. CASC, according to company documents, is the country’s sole manufacturer of intercontinental nuclear missiles, as well as a top contractor of military space technology, drones and launch systems.
CASIC describes itself as the “backbone” of China’s aerospace industry, overseeing the development of cruise and ballistic missiles among a vast range of other projects. “CASIC takes ‘empowering the military’ as its first duty and ‘building China into a space power’ as its own responsibility,” according to a description on its website.
Towering over a remote plain in Patagonia, Argentina, is the largest Chinese-made space facility in Latin America. A 35-meter-wide satellite dish at the Espacio Lejano Ground Station is operated by the PLA’s Strategic Support Force (SSF), according to a 2023 Pentagon report and two people who work for a Chinese-state space group and are familiar with the project’s operation. The SSF is the military unit that oversees the PLA’s space, cyber and electronic warfare programs.
Under a contract signed between the two countries, Argentina’s government agreed not to “interfere or interrupt” China’s activities at the ground-station facility.
In Venezuela, a Chinese state-owned company launched a satellite and built two ground stations — the largest of which is located inside Venezuela’s Capitán Manuel Ríos Airbase, a military airport in the country’s central north. The company, China Great Wall Industry Corp. (CGWIC), is the sole entity authorized to provide commercial satellite technology to international partners and is a wholly owned subsidiary of CASC.
The CGWIC also built the ground station in Bolivia and is the group that liaises with Bolivia’s space agency to conduct projects from its Andean base station.
Almost 6,200 miles south, a ground station antenna under construction at China’s Zhongshan base in Antarctica is being built by CASIC, according to Chinese state media. Another Chinese ground station under construction on the remote Antarctic outcrop of Inexpressible Island has drawn concerns from the Pentagon that it could “provide the PLA with better surveillance capabilities … well positioned to collect signals intelligence over Australia and New Zealand,” according to the Defense Department report released last month on military threats posed by China.
Map showing locations of Inexpressible Island and Zhongshan base
The Chinese technician who previously worked as a contractor on overseas projects for the CGWIC told The Washington Post that the lines between civilian and military are fluid in the state-owned firm and in China’s broader international space partnerships.
“They are the same, the same staff … military and civilian, you know in China there is no difference, this is the condition of our country’s space industry,” said the person. “The United States, Western countries, also do this type of work in secret conditions. Why not China?”
The CGWIC did not respond to a request for comment. CASC and CASIC did not respond to emails and calls to their Beijing headquarters.
A spokesman for the Chinese Embassy in Washington told The Post that he could not comment on specific country partnerships, but said Beijing is “for peaceful use of outer space.”
Spokesman Liu Pengyu said China is against the “weaponization” of space technology and does not support an “arms race” in outer space. “We promote an outer space community with shared future for mankind,” he said. Liu pointed to China’s cooperation with Brazil, using satellites to surveil earth resources, weather and other civilian applications as evidence of China’s successful role in the region’s space industry.
The Chinese Embassy in Bolivia did not respond to a request for comment.
Asked about the potential for China to use the CGWIC base for military purposes, Zambrana, director of the Bolivian space agency, dismissed the idea. “Go look for yourself,” he said, gesturing toward the nearby Amachuma Ground Station. “You won’t see any military.”
Rogelio Mayta, who spoke to The Post while serving as foreign minister in October, a role he stepped down from last week, said that Bolivia is alert to the potential of satellite technology being militarized, but feels it is unavoidable, and that the benefits to Bolivians outweigh those concerns. “We have to live with that potential reality and the aerospace capabilities of the great powers,” he said. “We know that it can imply a security risk.”
Beijing’s expanding space presence in Latin America has been carved along diplomatic lines, finding success in countries where relations with the United States and its allies have faltered.
As discussions on the formation of Bolivia’s space agency were underway in 2009, the country’s relations with the United States were at a crisis point.
President Evo Morales leveled sweeping accusations that the CIA was plotting against his government. Months earlier, he had expelled the U.S. ambassador and officials from the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration, accusing them of conspiracy, charges the U.S. Embassy in Bolivia called “absurd.”
At the time, Beijing was not deeply engaged in the country, which was emerging from an economically turbulent decade, but over the next 12 years it would become the country’s top international financier and infrastructure collaborator. In 2017, Bolivia’s vice president said the country would receive a $7 billion credit line from Beijing for infrastructure projects, double the country’s external debt at the time. This year, amid a severe shortage of U.S. dollars, Bolivia began trading in China’s currency, the yuan.
With the loans came expanded access for Chinese companies to the country’s vast natural resources, including lithium, and Bolivia obtained other advanced technology. In 2019, for instance, Bolivia launched the Bol-110 project, equipping police and emergency-response services in the country’s cities with Chinese-made surveillance systems.
When Beijing floated the $250 million loan for the Tupac Katari I satellite project, Bolivian space agency officials said the Chinese proposal was not only more comprehensive than alternative bids, but also represented a welcome alternative from what they perceived to be patronizing treatment from American and European space suppliers who were in contact with Bolivia at the time.
“There was an air of superiority in Americans and Europeans when dealing with Bolivia,” said Zambrana, who has headed the space agency since its inception in 2010, only stepping away from the role when an interim government took power for a year following a political crisis in 2019.
Within 10 months of the founding of the Bolivian space agency, the government signed a contract with the CGWIC for a package that included two ground stations and the Tupac Katari I satellite. As part of the agreement, Bolivia sent 64 scientists to study satellite technology at Beihang University, China’s top civilian and military aerospace university. They then continued their training alongside Chinese engineers at the newly constructed ground stations back in Bolivia.
“In general, there’s been a recognition over the last 10 years that the U.S. needed to up its soft power game to counter some of this,” said Brian Weeden, director of program planning for Secure World Foundation and an expert in space security. “What China was doing was filling in the gaps where the U.S. was not focused.”
Bolivian officials maintain they aren’t wedded to China as their sole space contractor and are actively considering other countries for future projects. They do, however, resent the idea that they would be forced to choose between the West and China.
“We don’t want to be told that we are with God or with the devil,” said Mayta, the former foreign minister. “That is, we believe that we can have a position open to everyone,” he said.
In Bolivia, while relations remain strong with China, much of the hype around the original space collaboration has faded. Plans for a second, Chinese funded, Earth-imaging satellite announced by the Morales government in 2017 and lauded for its potential to capture detailed data on the country’s land use, have been shelved indefinitely — deemed too costly.
Elsewhere in Latin America, other countries have continued to buy into a more ambitious vision of a China-led future in space. Venezuela — since its initial pact with the CGWIC in 2008 — has moved ahead with two further Chinese satellites. In September, it became the first Latin American country to formally join the China-led International Lunar Research Station project.
Despite the country’s cratering economy, President Nicolás Maduro vowed during a September state visit to Beijing that he would send “the first Venezuelan man or woman to the moon” with the help of China.
Among Pentagon documents leaked on the Discord chat platform in the spring was one that contained a stark assessment of China’s satellite capabilities in the southern hemisphere. It said the satellites were sophisticated beyond previous estimates, and Beijing already holds the ability to track, jam or destroy U.S. and allied satellites that would collect critical intelligence in the Indo-Pacific in the event of war in Taiwan.
“The PRC’s overall military strategy to establish and maintain information dominance in a conflict drives Beijing’s development of space,” it said.
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About this story
Story by Cate Cadell. Photos by Marcelo Perez del Carpio. Story editing by Peter Finn. Project editing by Courtney Kan. Photo editing by Jennifer Samuel. Design and development by Kat Rudell-Brooks and Yutao Chen. Maps by Cate Brown and Laris Karklis. Design editing by Joe Moore. Copy editing by Susan Doyle.
Satellite and Spacecraft Telemetry, Tracking, and Command (TTC) Stations: These world-wide TTC stations are operated by the Chinese Academy of Sciences and the People’s Liberation Army General Armament Department
Apart from the TTC at Beijing, the others on the mainland are located close to China’s international border: Kashgar (Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan), Yunnan (Myanmar), Qingdao (South Korea and Japan), Jiamusi (Russia) and Sanya (Vietnam and Philippines) [1] [2].
All the overseas TTC stations are in Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) countries: Karachi (Pakistan), Malindi (Kenya), Swakopmund (Namibia), and Neuquén (Argentina). The one in Karachi is close to Gwadar port and the one in Malindi to Mombasa and Lamu ports. Swakopmund is close to Walvis Bay port in Namibia and Porto de Caio is in Angola, both of which are upcoming BRI ports [3] [4] [5] [6]. Neuquén is situated close to numerous infrastructure assets constructed by China in South America, the Fibre Optic Austral in Chile and the China-funded multi-billion dollar turnkey railway and infrastructure projects in Argentina [7].
TTC stations in countries that have lower military technology capabilities and are unable to control or monitor their own daily operations may be used for covert military communications.
Fibre Optic Austral: Huawei Marine is laying the southernmost submarine optic-fibre cable in the world in Chile, the Fibre Optic Austral (FOA). Collaborating with the Chilean telecom service provider, Comunicación y Telefonía Rural S.A. (CTR), the cable will land on the cities of Puerto Montt, Tortel, Punta Arenas and Puerto Williams. Beijing is providing end-to-end submarine cable solutions and architecture for networking submarine and terrestrial cables [8].
Southern Chile, being a strategic location, FOA can enable Beijing to now survey the jagged terrain of the Chilean coast. The land-based FOA passes through two of the largest extrapolar (outside the Poles) ice fields in the world – the North Patagonian and the South Patagonian. The port cities of Punta Arenas and Puerto Williams are the logistics gateway to the Antarctic Peninsula, located as they are on the Strait of Magellan, and approximately 1,500 km from China’s Great Wall Research Station in Antarctica.
China can put to tactical use its familiarity with the extreme south of the Americas to patrol the interface of the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans both in the Strait of Magellan and Drake’s Passage.
Shanghai-Valparaiso Trans-Pacific Optic Cable: The government of Chile and Huawei Marine have signed a pre-feasibility agreement to connect China and Chile with an approximately 20,000 km-long trans-Pacific fibre-optic cable [9]. The exact route of the cable has not been finalised, but it is very likely to connect Shanghai and Valparaiso, passing through some of the island nations of Oceania and the Chilean Easter Islands.
If realised, this will be the first direct physical telecommunication connection between Asia, predominantly China, and South America.
China-Myanmar International Terrestrial Cable System: This land-based optic-fibre cable connects all the major cities of Myanmar – Mandalay, Naypyitaw (capital), Yangon, terminating at the beach resort of Ngwesaung. The cable extends northwards to the Chinese province of Yunnan, passing through the Chinese land port of Ruili [10]. Beijing is interested in financing and expanding the Thilawa port in Yangon. The optic-fibre cable passing via Yangon will be of significant use as a building block for this megaproject. Thilawa is a port of critical importance from the Indian perspective as it is less than 1,000 km away from the north-eastern tip of the Andaman Islands.
Nepal China Optic-Fibre Link: This land-based optic-fibre cable passes from the Tibetan town of Gyirong, through the land port of Rasuwagadhi, ending in Kathmandu [11]. The Tibetan Autonomous Region has an immense network of optic-fibre telecommunications, working as a strategic gradient to the sparsely connected Nepal, Bhutan and Indian border regions. Equipped with such a network, China is now able to exercise military as well as economic dominance across its under-developed borders.
Besides these terrestrial and long-range submarine optic-fibre projects, Beijing has acquired vast specialisation in island telecom connectivity, particularly that of small island nations.
Avassa Submarine Cable Project: China has connected the French Overseas Department of Mayotte with the three major islands of the Union of the Comoros – Grande Comore, Moheli and Anjoun [12]. This is a strange connection. Mayotte became a French Overseas Department as an outcome of a referendum, held in 2009, despite opposition from neighbouring Comoros, which long expressed its reservations about French rule in Mayotte. It should also be noted that the French telecom company, Orange S.A., is also constructing the Lower Indian Ocean Network (LION-3) optic-fibre cable between Mayotte and Grande Comore [13]. Beijing seems to be inserting itself, via Avassa, as a stakeholder in bilateral matters between Mayotte and Comoros.
Strategic Evolution Underwater Link: China has finished constructing an optic-fibre construction project in the Central American nation of Belize. It has built for Belize Telemedia Limited, a local telecom company, a 24-km-long submarine optic-fibre cable, connecting the mainland of Belize with its Ambergris Caye Island, passing through the ecologically sensitive Belize Barrier Reef [14].
MARS Submarine Cable: Huawei Marine is collaborating with the Hong-Kong based information communications technology company, Pacific Century CyberWorks (PCCW) Limited, to construct a 700-km-long submarine optic-fibre cable between the islands of Mauritius and Rodrigues in the Indian Ocean [15]. The cable will be constructed on the Mascarene Plateau, the second largest submarine plateau in the Indian Ocean with shallow depths of about 150-1,000 m. The Rodrigues Island is approximately 1,700 km from the U.S. military base of Diego Garcia and the optic-fibre project could be used for acoustic sensing of ship and submarine movements and seismic sensing.
Chaitanya Giri is Fellow, Space and Ocean Studies, Gateway House.
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References
[1] Retrieved from the Institute of Remote Sensing and Digital Earth, Chinese Academy of Sciences website. http://english.radi.cas.cn/RD/crssgs/
[2] D. Xu, G. Dong, G. Wang, H. Li, W. Jiang (2016). First geodetic VLBI sessions with the Chinese Deep Space Stations Jiamusi and Kashi. Advances in Space Research 58, 1638-1647.
[3] Retrieved from the Embassy of the People’s Republic of China in the Republic of Namibia website. http://na.china-embassy.org/eng/zt/znjj20/t711937.htm
[4] Retrieved from the Porto de Caio, Angola website http://www.portocaio.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/10/English_POC-Operations-release_October-2017.pdf
[5] Retrieved from the Government of Argentina portal. https://www.argentina.gob.ar/centros-y-estaciones/estacion-cltc-conae-neuquen
[6] C. Giri. New Delhi: Myopic beyond Mars. Retrieved from the Gateway House website. 6 November 2013. https://www.gatewayhouse.in/new-delhi-myopic-beyond-mars/
[7] J.F. Cooper. China’s Foreign Aid and Investment Diplomacy, Volume III. Strategy Beyond Asia and Challenges to the United States and the International Order. Palgrave Macmillan London-New York 2016. ISBN: 978-1-349-55595-6.
[8] Huawei Marine Press Release, Huawei Marine partners with CTR to deploy new undersea cable system in Southern Chile. 23 March 2018. http://www.huaweimarine.com/en/News/2018/press-releases/PR20180323
[9] Retrieved from the Undersecratary of Telecommunications, Government of Chile website. 17 April 2017. https://www.subtel.gob.cl/chile-firma-acuerdo-con-empresa-china-para-conectar-a-nuestro-pais-con-asia-a-traves-de-fibra-optica/
[10] BRICS Post, China telecom giant completes Myanmar optical cable line. 15 November 2014. http://thebricspost.com/china-telecom-giant-completes-myanmar-optical-cable-line/#.W2LtWKzXzIU
[11] Retrieved from the China Telecom Global website, http://www.chinatelecomglobal.com/CtgPortal/#/about/newsDetail?newsId=14047110
[12] Huawei News, Huawei Marine networks successfully deliver Avassa Submarine Cable Project. 18 November 2016, https://www.huawei.com/en/press-events/news/2016/11/Avassa-Submarine-Cable-Project
[13] Retrieved from the Orange S.A. website, 12 July 2017. https://www.orange.com/fr/Press-Room/communiques/communiques-2017/Orange-signe-un-accord-pour-la-construction-d-un-nouveau-cable-sous-marin-tres-haut-debit-entre-Mayotte-et-Grande-Comore
[14] Huawei News, Huawei Marine partners with Belize Telemedia to deploy new undersea cable system. 17 August 2016. https://www.huawei.com/en/press-events/news/2016/8/Deploy-New-Undersea-Cable-System
[15] Huawei News, Huawei Marine partners with PCCW to deploy MARS linking Mauritius and Rodrigues Island. 6 March 2018. https://www.huawei.com/en/press-events/news/2018/3/Huawei-Marine-PCCW-MARS
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