A synthetic aperture radar (SAR) system is able to provide all-weather, day-and- night superior imaging capability of the earth surface, and thus is extremely useful in surveillance for both civil and military applications. In this paper, the X-band high resolution spaceborne SAR system design is demonstrated with the key design performance for a given mission and system requirements characterized by the small satellite system. The SAR multi-mode imaging technique is presented with a critical parameter assessment, and the standard mode results are analyzed in terms of the image quality performances. In line with the system requirement X-band SAR payload and ground reception/processing subsystems are designed and the major design results are presented with the key performance characteristics. This small satellite SAR system shows the wide range of imaging capability with high resolution, and proves to be an effective surveillance systems in the light weight, high performance and cost-effective points of view.