TJS 3 / TJS 3 Subsatellite

TJS 3 (Tongxin Jishu Shiyan) is a Chinese geostationary satellite of unknown purpose.

The lack of public information has lead to the suspiction, that this satellite has a military mission. It has been speculated, that the satellite might be in fact a military SIGINT or early warning satellite. Reportedly the satellite is built on the SAST-5000 all electric bus and features a multi-frequency and high speed communications payload. A

TJS 3 was launched in December 2018 on a CZ-3C/G2 rocket. It entered geostationary orbit after a few days, which does not match an all electric propulsion. A seperated object was thought to be a chemical apogee kick stage, but as this object maneuvered after separation, it is considered a subsatellite.