A Russian military satellite has moved to within metres of a US-registered radar satellite that is believed to pass intelligence to Ukraine, according to space-tracking data cited by a US defence news site. The Russian craft, Cosmos 2612, may have passed the ICEYE-X36, which is owned by the US arm of the Finnish company ICEYE.
The space-tracking company LeoLabs estimated the closest approach at about 500 metres. ICEYE has supplied radar imagery to Ukraine since 2022, according to defence reporting, raising questions about whether Moscow is targeting satellites that support Kyiv from orbit.
Cosmos 2612 closes in on the ICEYE satellite
Cosmos 2612 is one of six satellites the Russian military launched in April. In May, four of them moved close to an ICEYE satellite, and ICEYE’s chief executive, Rafal Modrzewski, told Reuters that the company then moved its own satellite. That move appeared to prompt further manoeuvring by Russia.
According to LeoLabs, the Russian satellite closed from more than 320 km (200 miles) away to about 4.8 km (3 miles) between Thursday and Friday of the previous week. Over the weekend it shifted between positions ahead of and behind the ICEYE craft, at times coming within roughly 500 metres. In a report published on Monday, LeoLabs said that estimate was uncertain and that the Russian satellite had begun to move away by that day.
A Ukrainian official told Axios that Ukraine’s military works with ICEYE and uses its capabilities. The official said it was unclear, however, whether ICEYE-X36 itself supports Ukraine.
Experts weigh the risks of Russian space manoeuvres
Mark Hilborne, a senior lecturer in defence studies at King’s College London, said Russia has in the past mainly targeted Western military satellites rather than commercially owned ones. He pointed to early 2020, when two Russian satellites moved close to USA 245, a US spy satellite. In September 2025, German Defence Minister Boris Pistorius said two Russian Luch-Olymp satellites were tracking two Intelsat satellites used by the German military.
Hilborne called the latest approach "the first time that a country has done such a manoeuvre … against the commercial satellite without any consent". He said some reports put the distance at less than 30 metres, which he described as incredibly close. For him, the choice of target suggests Russia does not distinguish between commercial and military satellites when picking potential targets.
That distinction matters because militaries, including Ukraine’s, increasingly depend on commercial satellites for communications and imagery. Juliana Suess, a space security researcher at the German Institute for International and Security Affairs in Berlin, said Russia may calculate that reactions will be milder if it shadows a commercial satellite rather than a government-owned one, particularly one not belonging to the US. Hilborne noted that ICEYE-X36 is owned by ICEYE’s US subsidiary and registered as a US satellite, which he said "creates a complex problem".
Suess warned that the distance could still enable mischief. She said such proximity could allow Russia to intercept data from the satellite or disrupt its service, for instance through temporary signal jamming. She also said a physical attack was possible but seemed less likely for now, partly because it would be unprecedented. Hilborne said the move sends a message that such platforms could be held under threat, and that it signals escalation, since any satellite could in principle be used as a weapon by crashing it into another. An attack could also generate large amounts of space debris, he added.
Ukraine’s satellite access faces mounting pressure
Ukraine’s access to satellite data has been squeezed before, sometimes by its own allies. In March 2025, as Washington paused intelligence sharing with Kyiv, the US National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency temporarily suspended Ukraine’s access to the main portal for US government-purchased commercial imagery.
Suess said that losing ICEYE-X36 would not necessarily leave Ukraine blind, because the ICEYE network includes more than one satellite and sovereign radar satellites, such as Germany’s, could also provide data. The bigger problem is speed. According to ICEYE, an expanded access agreement reached this year allowed faster delivery, and Suess said the question is whether a comparable transfer could be arranged with a new provider.
Ukraine is also facing a separate restriction. Western officials said last week that the order to limit Starshield, the military-grade version of SpaceX’s Starlink service, for Ukraine came from inside the White House. On Saturday, US Secretary of State Marco Rubio said Starshield is currently unavailable to Ukraine, but that Kyiv’s request to use it for attacks deep inside Russia is "under discussion".
