At long last, there’s some good news for the most troubled part of the ballistic missile defense system. In testing this afternoon, an interceptor launched from Vandenberg Air Force Base in California caught up to a target warhead, and destroyed it.
“This was the first intercept of [an] operationally-configured warhead and booster, and the first intercept overall in nearly four years,” Victoria Samson, the ordinarily uber-skeptical missile defense analyst, told Defense Tech. She called the test “progress” after repeated failures in previous tests of the Ground-Based Midcourse Defense system to get an interceptor off of the launch pad. (Other anti-missile systems, including the shorter-range Terminal High-Altitude Air Defense and the sea-based Aegis Ballistic Missile Defense, have been performing much better.)
Interestingly, an intercept wasn’t even the main goal in this trial. Instead, it was designed to gauge the system’s “ability to successfully detect, track, [and] discriminate… a target in space,” a Raytheon statement observed.
The system appeared to do just that. “A key radar collected target information and shared it with an operationally configured interceptor, the interceptor used that data to zero in on a target in space, and battle managers oversaw this activity in real time from thousands of miles away,” added a Boeing statement. “The team is energized.“
The successful test was, not, however, the “full end-to-end” demonstration that Defense Secretary Don Rumsfeld said he wanted to see of the system.
“It’s missing key components — the sea-based X-band radar (which was used in the test, but only for the radar’s calibrations), the satellite network system needed to track the missiles (STSS), [and] threat-representative countermeasures for the target missile.” Samson noted.
Most importantly, the missile defenders knew where their target was going to fly before they shot off their interceptor. The real test will come when they don’t get that info beforehand.
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I’ll believe it when I see it
by davids: “To defend against a full blown nuke missile attack is impossible.“
Surely such a thing isn’t “impossible” in todays age. Even it its extremely complicated and hard to accomplish, (which there are far harder problems then that) I would think that something to protect the destruction of your country would be worth a shot.
davids, the Reagan-era dream of stopping a barrage of Soviet warheads is dead. The current system is meant to stop a small number of missiles such as we’d see from China or North Korea, not the full weight of the Strategic Rocket Force.
There are only a few places in the world who have a missile program with the technological capability of reaching CONUS. There are even fewer who are enemies of the US (Iran, North Korea, China); so we know pretty much where the missiles are going to come from in real life.
Good Morning Folks,
To my fellow critics of this $43billion and still spending Missile Defense System let the supporters have their day and drink there “Diet Pepsi” toasts to thire success.
If history provides any indication soon the truth will surface and this will be yet another rigged test that is just more smoke and mirrors intended for a Congress who is comming back after Labor Day to work on the DoD Budget.
Mean while X-Band lingers on in Pearl waiting to go up to the Gulf of Alaska. Can anyone provide insight why late November was selected as the time to install this $815million moving/stationary island in The Gulf of Alaska?
Do you think that the intellectuals in the Pentagon have confused Alaska with the Antarctica, where it will be nearing Spring?
ALLONS,
Byron Skinner
Neither the DPRK or Iran have missiles that can reach the US. Recent DPRK Taep’o-dong-2 tests failed, and in any case, the maximum projected range is about 4,000 mi., less than half the distance from Wonsan to San Francisco. The Iranian variant, the Shahab-4 (based on the Taep’o-dong-1) has a max. range of 1,800 mi. — far less than the 7,600 distance from Tehran to New York (maximum range = minimum payload).
Additionally, neither of these countries has a demonstrated nuclear capability. So before we talk about implementing SDI / NMD, we need to understand that these threats are non-existent. As for superpowers such as Russia and China, MAD persists as an effective deterrent.
A missile defense system can be easily and inexpensively countered with dummies, multiple or dispersing warheads, cooling shrouds (to defeat heat detection), etc. Other factors such as weather, reliability, overstated capability, cost, etc. will severely cripple the theoretical effectiveness of anti-missile systems. The much heralded
Reading through the briefings, this sounded like a very good and encouraging test. Basically real life. And this is the weakest of the 3 legs of MD.
The Sea based X band radar was addressed in the briefings. Apparently, it was involved in the test though its input wasn’t fully integrated. It will most likely be fully integrated for the December test — and it will be off Alaska.
As Reagan said, this will be a long and difficult process. That is why we have to start early and keep working on it. Our enemies are not asleep.
If you are concerned about decoys or “cooling shrouds”, you should read the briefing and some of the links — smart minds have been addressing these issues for along time.
As for whether San Fransisco should be saved or if we are breaking treaties — well, reading does take a lot of time away from TV.
EMP is a non-starter. An electrical utility clearing house did a study on the effects of EMP on the power grid, and found that at the altitudes required for a very far-reaching EMP effect, by the time the energy reaches the ground, through the inverse square law, the effect will be the same as a lightning strike some seven miles away.
About time we get something right. we must of got some new engineers or something because we couldn’t even hit a stationary target with those before.
Press releases from Boeing, the Pentagon and Raytheon hardly amount to evidence of a successful unbiased test.