Buzz Aldrin wants Trump to change the name of Space Force

The legendary astronaut suggests renaming it to "Space Guard"

Buzz Aldrin, astronaut (Getty)

Buzz Aldrin, the legendary NASA astronaut, is calling on President Donald Trump to rename the Space Force to something less antagonistic.

In June 2018, the White House announced the creation of a new branch in the armed forces that would be responsible for handling military operations in space.

Mr Aldrin, however, is not pleased with the branding.

“I have thought for some while that a better name would be ‘Space Guard,’ because it is more deterrent,” Mr Aldrin, who was the second man to step on the moon, told the Daily Mail.

“It is not strike,” he added. “We have a strike force that is aggressive. ‘Space Guard’ is more defensive and I think that is pretty much what people had in mind with the space force.”

The 89-year-old NASA icon said that, despite his distaste for the name, he believes the Space Force plan was “one giant leap in the right direction,” a reference to his 1969 Apollo 11 co-pilot Neil Armstrong’s first words when he set foot on the moon.

Space Force has caught the eye of Hollywood. Earlier this year, Netflix announced a new comedy series called Space Force created by and starring The Office’s Steve Carrell.

The need for a new military space branch was prompted when news broke that the Chinese military tested a new anti-spacecraft missile in 2007. In the test, the Chinese launched the missile into space and blew up one of their satellites in orbit.

The Chinese People’s Liberation Army Strategic Support Force is the only military wing dealing exclusively with “war fighting” in space, the Daily Mail reported.

Russia had their own version of a space military branch from 1992 to 1997 called the “Russian Space Forces.” It re-opened the military wing once again from 2001 to 2011, but in 2015, it was brought under the domain of Russia’s air force.

Prior to the creation of Space Force, the US military’s space-related warfare was shared between the Air Force and other branches. In June 2018, Mr Trump signed the Space Policy Directive-3—a new law governing space traffic—decreeing the Department of Defence “to immediately begin the process necessary to establish a space force as the sixth branch of the armed forces.”

Last week, Mr Trump said his new budget will include “a space-based missile defence layer,” adding that this plan is “ultimately going to be a very, very big part of our defence—and, obviously, for our offence.”

The US Air Force Space Command, an agency established in 1982 handling space forces support and control, has a $8.5 billion budget with about 36,000 workers, and the National Reconnaissance Office, an extremely clandestine branch of the intelligence services, with a budget estimated around $15 billion.

“We will recognise that space is a new war-fighting domain with the Space Force leading the way,” Mr Trump added.

The president said the Space Force would be “separate but equal” from other military branches. General Joseph Dunford, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, is leading the project.

"The Air Force is going to focus on the Air Force,”Mr Trump said. “We need a separate branch, and we’re working on that. It’s called the Space Force, which is very exciting. People love it, they get it.”