AFRL's fiscal 2025 budget plans show that the lab hopes to complete testing of the capability to air-drop cargo pallets down from Starship during FY25, and to launch a demonstration flight to "transport 30 to 100 tons of cargo to an austere site" in late FY25 or early FY26.
Meanwhile, the report says, the Space Force should be in charge of pursuing large networks of small satellites under the Space Development Agency's Proliferated Warfighter Space Architecture (PWSA) — differentiating its "tactical ISR" job from the "strategic" mission of NRO.
The investment in transitioning Rocket Cargo "is focused on utilizing vehicles that traverse from or through space to transport DoD materiel anywhere around the world within tactically responsive timelines," the Space Force's FY25 budget request says.
Stephen "Bucky" Butow, director of space at the Pentagon's Defense Innovation Unit summed up the end goal for future operations as creating a "blue collar space."
Listing a series of theoretical space capabilities, the Ministry of Defence’s Director for Space, Air Vice-Marshal Harv Smyth, said, "Who would not be excited by this?"
Brig. Gen. John Olson, who advises CSO Gen. Jay Raymond on space logistics issues, believes the US must rapidly act to take the "first mover advantage" for itself to block Chinese ambitions, which could include territorial claims in space.
Blending superior optics, advanced stabilization and AI-powered autonomy in a compact and rugged system, ASELFLIR 600 delivers unmatched intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance (ISR) capabilities.
If industry can "turn this into a human transport mechanism -- which some of the companies are talking about doing -- sure the DoD would be interested in exploring options for that, just as we do with the airlines, and the shipping industries today,"AFRL's Program Manager Greg Spanjers said.