Posted on 06/27/2012 12:58:40 PM PDT by xzins
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. forces using a new Raytheon Co interceptor missile downed another missile in space in a high-stakes test of a shield built to thwart growing capabilities of countries like North Korea and Iran.
The mission off Hawaii late Tuesday was against a medium-range, separating ballistic missile, the Pentagon agency responsible for it said. The mock warhead split from the target's booster section, presenting what is supposed to be a more realistic attack scenario.
"Initial indications are that all components performed as designed resulting in a very accurate intercept," the Missile Defense Agency, or MDA, said in a statement Wednesday.
Richard Lehner, an agency spokesman, declined to say whether the drill incorporated decoys or other so-called countermeasures of the type an enemy likely would use to confuse the defense.
"We don't divulge presence of countermeasures in any of our missile defense tests," he said by email.
The United States plans to deploy increasingly capable versions of Raytheon's Standard Missile-3 through 2020 to help counter missiles that might some day be capable of delivering chemical, biological or nuclear warheads from Iran or North Korea.
(Excerpt) Read more at reuters.com ...
Remember his unknowingly taped comment to the Russian president in the spring in which he said he had to wait until after the election to get rid of the ABM system.
He's putting our women/wives, children, and security in jeopardy.
Any war on American security is the real war on women.
Weakness is the prelude to attack is what military history teaches.
Press release: http://raytheon.mediaroom.com/index.php?s=43&item=2117
Photos and videos: http://www.mda.mil/news/gallery_aegis.html
Amen to that.
Do you remember that the democrats at the time were pushing for total missile disarmament?
Not only did Reagan stand up to them, but he came up with the Star Wars counter, and with that and increased military budget, he checkmated the Soviet Union.
How I wish God would give us another Ronald Reagan.
What is remarkable is that they hit it AFTER it split from the booster.
It suggests a defense against Multiple entry warheads.
Because Russia and China would NEVER do such a thing...
Oh, yeah, it's Reuters.
And the LSM mocked Reagan claiming it was impossible (Star Wars). I hope the Gipper is having a hearty chuckle now.
I'm amazed that we keep pretending Russia is toothless.
Force fields, flying cars and laser weapons (ones that go ZAPP!)
How come we can’t get the technology we were promised as kids?
I wish this government would shut the hell up.. for the love of bid already...
I wish this government would shut the hell up.. for the love of god already...
Stopping a multi-thousands warhead attack by a country with MIRVs and decoys, was, is, and always will be, technically and fiscally impossible. It will always be cheaper for the adversary to just build more missiles than for the defense to stop them. Star Wars would not have worked to stop most of an attack by even the current Russian nuclear forces if we'd spent the entire GDP of the US every year for 20 years on the project.
Using the test today as "proof" that Star Wars would have worked is like saying someone wearing a kevlar vest surviving being shot by a single .22 round is "proof" that the vest would ALSO protect the person if they were surrounded by a dozen guys with .50 machine guns each blowing through a thousand rounds.
Nope, but protecting the most strategic asset would have been a deterrent. It made a retaliation-free first strike real possibility.
You guard only a select number of missile silos, so that you can ALWAYS launch.
However, I disagree with impossible. Once the laser intercept is perfected, it is entirely possible to target massive numbers of incoming. And that makes both survivability and retaliation a real probability.
They are toothless. With the exception around 500 ICBM's their military is a train wreck. Their fighter pilots rarely fly, their boomers(the ones that can actually put to sea) do at most 2 patrols per year, their once massive fleet of nuclear subs are now sitting, rusting hulks awaiting disposal. Their T-72's are in warehouses decaying next to their APC's. The ranks are rife with alcoholism and crippled by a lack of an NCO corps. Can I stop now?
You could have stopped at...
500 ICBMs.
I wonder what percentage of them will actually ignite, fly and deploy warheads when the button is pushed.
What percentage of successful launches should we consider absolutely safe?
f & j
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