WASHINGTON, May 22 (Reuters) - SpaceX on Wednesday

launched an inaugural batch of operational spy satellites it

built as part of a new U.S. intelligence network designed to

significantly upgrade the country's space-based surveillance

powers, the first deployment of several more planned this year.

The spy network was revealed in a pair of Reuters reports

earlier this year showing SpaceX is building hundreds of

satellites for the U.S. National Reconnaissance Office, an

intelligence agency, for a vast system in orbit capable of

rapidly spotting ground targets almost anywhere in the world.

Northrop Grumman ( NOC ), a longtime space and defense

contractor, is also involved in the project.

SpaceX's Falcon 9 rocket lifted off from the Vandenberg

Space Force Base in Southern California at 4 a.m. EDT on

Wednesday, carrying into space what the NRO said was the "first

launch of the NRO's proliferated systems featuring responsive

collection and rapid data delivery."

"Approximately half a dozen launches supporting NRO's

proliferated architecture are planned for 2024, with additional

launches expected through 2028," the agency said, without naming

the number of satellites deployed.

Militaries and intelligence agencies around the world have

increasingly relied on satellites in Earth's orbit to aid

operations on Earth, a trend accelerated in part by reduced

costs of putting things in space and evolving threats to

traditional collection methods on land or in the air.

The satellite network for the NRO also shows the extent to

which the U.S. government has come to rely on Elon Musk's SpaceX

for some of its most sensitive missions. The company has

dominated the U.S. rocket launch market and has become the

world's largest satellite operator with its Starlink network, a

commercial system of thousands of broadband internet satellites.