A Major Success for Missile Defense
Another success for the right of self-defense:
The U.S. military shot down a target ballistic missile over the Pacific on Friday in the widest test of its emerging antimissile shield in 18 months, the Defense Department announced. The Pentagon’s Missile Defense Agency said it had successfully completed an important exercise involving the launch of an improved ground-based interceptor missile designed to protect the United States against a limited long-range ballistic missile attack. The test results will help improve the performance of a multibillion-dollar shield against the type of long-range ballistic missile that could be used to attack a U.S. city with a weapon of mass destruction, the agency said in a statement.
[….]
In the exercise, a target missile was launched from Kodiak, Alaska.
Certain despotic rogue leaders are no doubt disappointed. Of course, I’m referring to Margaret Floyd. Don’t let her grandmotherly appearance fool you; Kim Jong Il’s doesn’t make him any less dangerous, either.
It’s more of a political success than a technological success. It will help keep the program well funded so that the real effective systems have a chance to come to fruition. Kinetic energy ABM’s will be the least capable systems in a broader network that includes directed energy systems such as the airborne laser. The ABL would be very effective against a country like North Korea because the planes, which are 747’s carrying huge megawatt class lasers, could patrol just off of NK. NK’s missiles could be shot down in their boost phase and would be well within range of the ABL. A demonstration is scheduled for 2008.
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/11961673/
Even more capable would be the space based laser.
http://www.missilethreat.com/systems/sbl_usa.html
This may have been moved to a black project.
The current success reinforces the fact that Kim Jong Il is running out of ways to threaten others and that his days are numbered.
I’ve never actually been that afraid of a first strike from KJI’s missiles. Deterrence alone is enough to prevent that. However, as a retaliatory weapon, they do limit our first strike options. If we decide that we must take out a NK target preemptively, then we now need missile defense.
My greatest fear about North Korea has always been proliferation … that they would become the Arsenal of Terror.
The Reuters wire story left out the following critical details:
At 10:45.02a.m. PDT, a missile defense interceptor going over 16,000 miles per hour directly hit a target missile warhead traveling upwards of 15,000 miles per hour over 100 miles up in space. This high-speed kinetic energy explosion destroyed both missiles leaving heat and dust as remains.
This morning, as the fog lifted along the California coast, the ground-based interceptor flew out of the Ronald Reagan Missile Defense Site at Vandenberg Air Force Base reaching speeds of 16-18,000 miles per hour on its way to intercept an incoming target missile going speeds of more than 15,000 miles per hour and more than 100 miles in space. The solid fuel three stage target missile was launched at 10:22a.m. from the Kodiak Launch Complex in Kodiak, Alaska traveling 1,800 miles south down the West Coast. The Ground-Based Interceptor launched 17 minutes later at 10:39a.m. and flew to the west on a direct course to intersect the path of the target warhead. The interceptor received updates from the command and control system, primarily the warning radar located at Beale Air Force Base north of Sacramento, California. The interceptor used its on-board sensors to track and identify the target warhead, and steered into position to make a direct collision with the warhead measuring four feet in length.
These details are key because we’ve had, for a while, the ability to shoot down ballistic missiles shortly after launch, during the boost phase – while they were traveling at thousands of miles per hour. Now we know we have the ability to take them down while they’re streaking through space – 100 miles above sea level – at 16,000 miles per hour. This is a major breakthrough, and vastly improves our defenses against these missiles.