A systems thinking approach to defining a space force architecture

The United States military services, government, and civilian population rely on the US military's historic technical dominance in outer space. Space-enabled capabilities have become fundamental across the spectrum of military and civilian activities. The space superiority gap that the US military has held for decades is narrowing as access to space technology, and to space itself, becomes more widespread, allowing more nations, private industry, and non-state actors to become significant players in space. In response to this trend, the US Department of Defense and Congress are seeking to establish the Space Force as an independent branch of the Armed Forces. This thesis applies a systems thinking method to designing the structure and function of the Space Force. Through review of open-source literature, the study summarizes the current state of the military space enterprise and assesses the arguments made by advocates of various approaches to organizing the space forces.

Name thesis:degree_name

Master

Department dc:contributor.department

Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Engineering and Management Program

Grantor dc:publisher

Massachusetts Institute of Technology

Year dc:date.issued

2019

Author dc:creator

• Thornton, Robert F.(Robert Francis)

Advisor dc:contributor.advisor

• Bryan R. Moser.

• Engineering and Management Program.
• System Design and Management Program.

Statement dc:rights

• MIT theses are protected by copyright. They may be viewed, downloaded, or printed from this source but further reproduction or distribution in any format is prohibited without written permission.

Licence dc:rights.uri

• http://dspace.mit.edu/handle/1721.1/7582

Language dc:language.iso

eng

Handle dc:identifier.uri

https://hdl.handle.net/1721.1/121801

OAI identifier oai:identifier

oai:dspace.mit.edu:1721.1/121801