MOSCOW, December 18. /TASS/. Russia’s Aerospace Forces will be formed by the summer of 2015. They will comprise aviation, air defense and missile defense forces, as well as space forces, a high-ranking source in the Russian Defense Ministry told TASS on Thursday.

Commander-in-Chief of the Russian Air Force Viktor Bondarev told reporters earlier that it was planned to create the Aerospace Forces by the beginning of 2016.

“The decision to form the Aerospace Forces by including the Air Force and Aerospace Defense Forces in full strength was made at the highest level, the organizational activities are currently underway and the new branch of the Armed Forces is to start functioning from the summer of 2015,” the source said.

He added that aviation, antiaircraft defense and missile defense troops, as well as space forces, will be subordinated to the Aerospace Forces commander.

According to the source, the Aerospace Forces aviation will include all the aviation branches of the current Air Force, including army aviation. However, the front-line and army aviation, except jet fighters, will be included in the Aerospace Forces “only nominally,” the source said. In fact, he added, it will be used in accordance with the plans of commanders of troops of military districts.

As for the antiaircraft defense forces, missile defense troops of the Aerospace Forces, the source said they would “include all the current air defense assets within the Air Force and Aerospace Defense Forces, including air defense divisions that have been newly formed in both structures, as well as the existing and developed missile defense systems.”

And the Space Forces “will include everything related to the launch of spacecraft, orbital constellation control, the missile attack warning system within the ground-based and space echelons and cosmic space control,” he said.

He said that the Ground Forces would not participate in the Aerospace Forces creation. “Neither units of the army antiaircraft defense nor the missile troops and artillery, including the Iskander missile systems, nor any other Ground Forces means will be included in the Aerospace Forces,” he added.