China earlier this month said it would develop new ground stations in Antarctica to support its satellite activity and data collection as concerns grow over Beijing’s surveillance programs and growing security threats directed at the United States.
A subsidiary of the state-owned China Aerospace Science and Industry Corporation (CASIC), China Space News said the defense contractor had won a bid of 43.95 million yuan ($6.52 million) to build a satellite ground system for ocean observation.
The looming upgrade of China’s satellite capabilities has raised immediate concern about Beijing’s surveillance programs and how the expansion of their data-gathering capabilities might be enhanced by this Antarctic development.
But new facilities to be developed on the existing Zhongshan research base in East Antarctica have one expert worried for other reasons.
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The Shenzhou-13 manned spacecraft, atop a Long March-2F carrier rocket, launches from the Jiuquan Satellite Launch Center in northwest China’s Gobi Desert, Oct. 16, 2021. (Chinatopix Via AP)
Rick Fisher, a senior member of the International Assessment and Strategy Center, told Fox News Digital that worrying activity has been going on at the Zhongshan base for years.
The Chinese base, opened in 1989, was built for research related to marine, glaciological, geological and atmospheric sciences. But, according to the Chinese military expert, by 2021, under the guise of civilian research, China would have started to employ advanced military capabilities.
“In 2021, state media revealed that China had put a LIDAR – a laser radar – into Zhongshan station to conduct ‘atmospheric research,'” Fisher told Fox News Digital. “Any type of laser raises the possibility that LIDAR could be upgraded to be a much more powerful laser.”
Fisher explained that using a more powerful laser from the Zhongshan base will allow China to damage or destroy targeted satellites.
The technology used to damage a satellite could also break off pieces of the device and increase the amount of debris in low Earth orbit which could further damage existing satellites.
The Zhongshan research base was built in line with the 1959 International Antarctic Treaty which states that the world’s southernmost continent will be used exclusively for peaceful scientific research and prohibits any military maneuvers, an agreement that China, along with other 51 nations, hit .
The Chinese research icebreaker Xuelong arrives at the Zhongshan station roadstead in Antarctica, Dec. 1, 2018. The research team carried out the unloading work using a helicopter. (Xinhua/Liu Shiping via Getty Images)
The United States and its military have supported research missions to Antarctica for nearly seven decades, but Fisher says there is a big difference.
“The United States, Germany, Norway and perhaps other countries also had space probe facilities in Antarctica. However, none of them are developing fractional orbital bombardment systems (FOBS), like China,” he said.
FOBS date back to a Cold War-era missile program that sought to circumvent early US warning detection systems by launching a nuclear warhead from the south onto South America instead of from the west onto Russia.
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According to Fisher, the program was made obsolete with the development of early warning detectors for deep space, but the expert warned that China has revived this technology and tested its FOBS capabilities twice in 2021.
“If you’re going to attack the United States like that, going through Antarctica, it’s extremely useful to have the ability to upgrade a FOBS bus,” he said, referring to the technology that would launch a nuclear warhead or hypersonic bus missile.
A photo taken on February 9, 2019 shows a main building of Zhongshan Station, a Chinese research base in Antarctica. (Xinhua/ via Getty Images)
This would ensure “that the bus that would launch these weapons has the most accurate aiming upgrades and can achieve the highest accuracy in hitting targets across the United States,” Fisher added.
Few details have been released about new ground stations to be developed at China’s Antarctic base, but Beijing’s military influence over its space program has sparked widespread concern about its space ambitions.
“The Zhongshan base is becoming … a surveillance site from which we can better target American satellites. It is a base that … will be able to guide new Chinese space weapons to American targets,” Fisher said.
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“And because it’s at the South Pole, it may play a bigger role in helping China populate the Moon,” he added, referring to a new space race that may be underway.
Neither the State Department nor the Pentagon have responded to Fox News Digital.
