Russia carried out a test of an anti-satellite missile on Wednesday, the U.S. military said, calling it an example of the threats the United States faced in space.

The move comes as officials have said that space will increasingly become an important domain for warfare, with the U.S. and other countries such as Russia and China stepping up their military postures in low-Earth orbit and near the moon.

Experts say that anti-satellite weapons that shatter their targets pose a space hazard by creating a cloud of fragments that can collide with other objects, potentially setting off a chain reaction of projectiles through Earth orbit.