 On August 1, 2015, the Space Forces were reestablished as part of the Russian Aerospace Forces.The main tasks of the Russian Space Forces are informing the higher political leaders and military commanders of missile attacks as soon as possible, ballistic missile defence, and the creation, deployment, maintenance and control of in-orbit space vehicles, like the new Persona reconnaissance satellite.For example, the Space Forces operate the GLONASS global positioning system; commander of the Space Forces Colonel General Vladimir Popovkin said in January 2006 that 18 GLONASS satellites would be in orbit by 2008.