SpaceX Starshield

Starshield is SpaceX's military variant of Starlink — a special build of Starlink satellites with end-to-end encryption, plus optional payload bays for military sensors ("hosted payloads") such as SDA Tranche 1/2 for missile tracking, and optical inter-satellite links for crypto-protected mesh comms. NRO contract USD 1.8 billion 2021 (Reuters/WSJ reporting 2024) to build out the constellation. Ukraine receives comparable services via the civilian Starlink constellation (Starlink terminals are the backbone of Ukrainian C2 since March 2022).