A Washington Post report this week that the White House is reconsidering a 2021 decision to move the U.S. Space Command to Alabama has excited speculation that the headquarters may remain in New Mexico’s neighboring state of Colorado.
Albuquerque made the short list of six cities that the U.S. Air Force considered as a permanent base for the Space Command. Those hopes were dashed in January 2021 when the Air Force announced Huntsville, Alabama, as the new site of Space Command headquarters.
The Space Command is separate from the U.S. Space Force, which former President Donald Trump authorized in late 2019 as the sixth branch of the U.S. military. The Space Command is a unified combatant command that will oversee all military space operations, from deterring aggression to defeating adversaries in an attack.
Keeping the U.S. Space Command in Colorado would be good news for New Mexico, an Albuquerque business leader said Friday.
Kirtland Air Force Base is home to several Space Force initiatives that benefit from Albuquerque’s close proximity to Colorado Springs, where Space Command and its predecessors have been based for decades, said Sherman McCorkle, who works closely with Kirtland.
“The fact that we are closely located improves the opportunity to grow the various Space Force assets that are currently on Kirtland,” said McCorkle, a founder of the Kirtland Partnership Committee, an Albuquerque business group that supports the base.
The committee wrote Albuquerque’s proposal to relocate Space Command to Kirtland.
Kirtland’s Space Force initiatives “would survive if Space Command was in Alabama, but it is very helpful if it is in Colorado Springs,” he said.
McCorkle estimated that nearly 3,000 people, both military and civilian, work directly for Space Force programs based at Kirtland. That includes nearly 1,000 uniformed personnel and some 2,000 civilians, he said.
Those initiatives have a combined budget of about $700 million, he estimated.
“It is certainly meaningful,” McCorkle said of the economic impact on the state.
New Mexico benefits from long-term relationships between Kirtland and Schriever Space Force Base in Colorado Springs.
Washington Post columnist David Ignatius reported Thursday that President Biden’s administration has asked for a review of the decision to move Space Command to Alabama. Biden fears moving the headquarters from its longtime base in Colorado would disrupt space operations at a time of rising military tensions, the Post reported.
The report quoted three top military space officials, including Air Force Gen. John Hyten, a former head of Space Command, who said that in a meeting at the White House in 2021, they recommended Colorado Springs over Alabama because it offered the quickest route to full operational capability.
