A Chinese satellite picture of US fighter jets standing on the runway Prince Sultan Air Base in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia (KSA) has shaken the military analyst community.

Released by Hangzhou-based startup MizarVision, the annotated image showed what US-based publication Aviation Week later confirmed showed over a dozen US planes massed at the airbase in preparation for the start of Operation Epic Fury on February 28.

The quality of the image had a resolution of under one meter and the planes on the tarmac were identified by what was presumed to be an AI, giving their type and specification. Until the release of this image on the public internet, it was assumed that only the US had satellites of this quality and resolution. The image suggests that the US has lost its monopoly on space-based surveillance.

China’s commercial space sector has entered an epoch-changing era in a way that could reshape modern conflicts, according to Shanaka Anslem Perera, author of The Ascent Begins and political analyst, who argues that the publication of detailed satellite imagery of US military assets in Saudi Arabia demonstrates the “democratisation of intelligence”.

The planes standing in readiness in KSA included: 15 KC-135 aerial refuelling tankers, six KC-46 Pegasus tankers, six E-3 Sentry airborne early warning aircraft, two E-11A Battlefield Airborne Communications Nodes, as well as C-130 Hercules and C-5 Galaxy transport aircraft.

Some of those details are of obvious significance. The E-3 surveillance planes are especially rare, as the US fleet is made of some 30 of these planes, easily identifiable by their very large round radar housing that sits above the fuselage and are essential for monitoring and communications during a hot conflict. A fifth of the US entire stock of these planes was plainly visible at Prince Sultan Air testifying the imminence of the start of Operation Epic Fury over a week before it started.

The picture also strongly suggests that China is sharing its advanced satellite images of US military distribution in the Middle East with Tehran that can be used to target Iran’s missile attacks on US bases as soon as the hostilities broke out.

“China is sharing its advanced satellite spy technology with Iran,” Perera said. “You are looking at a Chinese commercial satellite photograph of Prince Sultan Air Base in Saudi Arabia. Every red box is an artificial intelligence model identifying a US military aircraft by type. Every label is in Mandarin.”

“Only thirty-one E-3s remain in the entire US Air Force inventory worldwide, meaning roughly a fifth of America’s operational AWACS fleet is parked on a single ramp in the Saudi desert,” Perera noted.

The base was subsequently targeted by Iranian ballistic missiles, with AFP journalists reporting explosions in Riyadh’s eastern districts. Saudi authorities said air defences intercepted the missiles. The fate of the planes is unknown. The significance lies not in the strike itself but in the accessibility of the intelligence.

“The backbone of Operation Epic Fury, catalogued from space and published on Weibo. This is the base that Iran targeted,” he said. “Which means Iran had exactly the same intelligence picture that MizarVision gave the entire world for free.”

The release of the image represents a structural shift in military intelligence.

“This is what the democratization of intelligence looks like,” Perera said. “In 1991, only the United States could see individual aircraft on a ramp from space. In 2003, a handful of nations had that capability. In 2026, a Chinese startup publishes annotated satellite imagery of American force dispositions on social media, and Aviation Week runs the analysis before the first missile is fired.”

Citing analysis from Defence Security Asia, Perera added that “sub-meter resolution imagery distinguishing individual aircraft types fundamentally alters the secrecy calculus of pre-strike deployments”.

“You cannot mass two hundred aircraft across half a dozen bases and keep it secret when commercial satellites photograph every ramp twice a day and AI models label every airframe before an analyst finishes their coffee,” he said. “The age of hidden buildups is over.”

“The next war will not be planned in secret,” Perera concluded. “It will be watched from orbit by everyone, in every language, simultaneously.”