Between 10th and 21st August 2025, more than 350 participants from the US Department of Defense (DOD), industry and partner nations took part in Schriever Wargame 2025 (SW 25) – the unique space exercise, held at the LeMay Center’s Wargame Institute at Maxwell Air Force Base, Alabama.
The Schriever Wargame trainings were originally established in 1998, with the first exercise held in 2001. At that time, the series of wargames was aimed at preparing the military for future space operations. Over the years, the exercise has become increasingly complex and sophisticated by incorporating emerging technologies and critical space issues, as well as focused on identifying solutions to anticipated challenges, and advancing space support within air, land, sea, space, and cyberspace doctrine.
It took two years of planning for the Space Training and Readiness Command (STARCOM) and the Space Delta 10 of the US Space Force to prepare the exercise activities. The seventieth iteration of Schriever Wargame was focused on seeking answer to key question of how the United States and its allies will “conduct operations in space to support terrestrial objectives in an ever-increasing environment of space congestion infiltrating all orbits around Earth”.
In other words, participants from the US Space Force and the nine partner nations (Australia, Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, New Zealand, Norway and the United Kingdom) spent two weeks on planning of space operations and establishing international cooperation around a fictional scenario set a decade in the future.
SW 25 was a tabletop wargame in which players responded to a notional conflict scenario and tested the limits of their strategies and policies, as well as focused on use of advanced technologies to strengthen their operations.
The exercise was led by the aforementioned Space Delta 10, the US Space Force´s wargaming and doctrine-development unit from Space Training and Readiness Command at Patrick Space Force Base, Florida.
“The wargame allows the air and space forces from the U.S and nine international partners to see the impacts of their decisions in a fast-paced scenario and ask, ´Do our policies and proposed capabilities hold up in a fight? What would we need to change if scenario X or Y happens?’” – said Col. Shannon DaSilva, Space Delta 10 commander.
“It also lets them explore what technologies they would like to have if those scenarios occurred. The wargame helps inform the future force design and acquisitions process to ensure the US and its allies remain the most formidable combat force the world has ever seen. SW 25 allows participants to ask, ‘What future capabilities, policies and interoperability do we wish we had?’ not just, ‘What can we do with what we’ve got?’” – emphasised DaSilva.
Cover photo: Schriever Wargame 2025 logo (US Space Force)
All photos and quotations © U.S. Department of Defence (DoD). DoD information materials were used, in compliance with Public Domain licence. The appearance of U.S. Department of Defense (DoD) visual information does not imply or constitute DoD endorsement.
