Military expert and retired colonel Mikhail Khodarenok said deliberate electronic interference with another country’s systems could be regarded as the beginning of hostilities.

He was commenting on reports that Britain is using electronic warfare systems to jam and block foreign satellites for military purposes.

According to Khodarenok, organized jamming carried out even in peacetime can be treated as the start of military action. He argued that if such interference were directed against Russian systems, it would already amount to the beginning of hostilities.

Khodarenok noted that satellites play a critical role in navigation, the use of precision-guided weapons, modern communications and the transmission of large volumes of data.

He said one of the most serious risks would be disruption to missile warning systems. In his assessment, the loss of reliable space-based communications could have severe consequences for Russia.

Against that backdrop, Khodarenok said electronic warfare against an adversary’s satellite constellation has become a key military task.

British media reported earlier that the Royal Air Force uses systems capable of jamming or blocking foreign satellites in order to reduce threats to its own armed forces.

According to those reports, such systems could be used to prevent satellites belonging to countries regarded by London as hostile from tracking the movements of British nuclear-armed submarines or monitoring secret military operations.