1st Space Brigade


The 1st Space Brigade is a United States Army unit. Assigned to the United States Army Space and Missile Defense Command, it is responsible for providing space combat power support to Army units. Activated in 2005 as a TOE unit after being provisionally active since 2003, it is headquartered at Colorado Springs, Colorado.
The 1st Space Brigade was activated in May 2003, with the 1st Space Battalion, the 1st Satellite Control Battalion, and the 193rd Space Battalion. On 20 October 2007 the provisional 193rd Space Battalion became a permanent-status unit, the 117th Space Battalion.
The provisional brigade's mission was to "conduct continuous, global space support, space control and space force enhancement operations in support of U.S. Strategic Command and Supported Combatant Commanders enabling the delivery of decisive combat power."
53rd Signal Battalion conducted payload and transmission control of the Defense Satellite Communications System and Wideband Global Satellite Communications System constellations. It was later reorganised and transferred to the Space Force.
In Fiscal Year 2019, five missile defense batteries were assigned to 1st Space Brigade including two in Japan and one each in Israel, Turkey, and Qatar.

Structure

  • 10th Missile Defense Battery, Shariki, Japan
  • 11th Missile Defense Battery, Turkey
  • 12th Missile Defense Battery, Saudi Arabia
  • 13th Missile Defense Battery, Israel
  • 14th Missile Defense Battery, Kyogamisaki, Japan
The brigade also has five missile defense batteries equipped with AN/TPY-2 forward-based radar conducting ballistic missile tracking operations in support of theater and homeland defense. The forward-based radar may also be used to conduct space surveillance and data collection. In 2023, the brigade also operated Site 512, a United States Department of Defence radar facility in Negev, Israel.
The 117th Space Battalion, Colorado Army National Guard has a training, readiness, and oversight relationship with the 1st Space Brigade but is not actually part of it, as of 2021.

List of commanders

  • COL Timothy R. Coffin, 27 July 2006
  • COL Jeffrey A. Farnsworth, 10 July 2008
  • COL Eric P. Henderson, 30 June 2010
  • COL James R. Meisinger, July 2012
  • COL Thomas L. James, 11 July 2014
  • COL Richard Zellmann, 21 June 2016
  • COL Eric D. Little, 13 July 2018
  • COL Brian C. Bolio, 1 July 2020
  • LTC Whitney Hall, ~2020
  • COL Donald K. Brooks, 5 March 2021