OT: U.S. Missile Defense System: Is There a Bigger Failure?

[Subby]

http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmp...missile_usa_dc

Test Failure Sets Back U.S. Missile Defense Plan

By Jim Wolf

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - President Bush (news - web sites)'s drive to deploy a multibillion-dollar shield against ballistic missiles was set back on Wednesday by what critics called a stunning failure of its first full flight test in two years.

The abortive $85 million exercise raised fresh questions about the reliability of the first elements of the plan, an heir to former president Ronald Reagan (news - web sites) vision of a space-based missile defense that critics dubbed "Star Wars."

The interceptor missile never left its silo at Kwajalein Atoll in the central Pacific, shutting itself down automatically because of an "anomaly" of unknown origin, the Pentagon (news - web sites)'s Missile Defense Agency said.

About 16 minutes earlier, a target missile had been fired from Kodiak, Alaska, in what was to have been a fly-by test chiefly designed to gather data on new hardware, software and engagement angles, said Richard Lehner, a spokesman.

The Pentagon plans to spend more than $50 billion over the next five years on all aspects of missile defense, aiming to weave in airborne, ship- and space-based assets. The system that failed on Wednesday is know as the ground-based midcourse system. By some accounts, the Pentagon has already spent $130 billion on its missile defense efforts.

Despite widespread doubts among physicists about the technical readiness of the system, Bush had sought to have a rudimentary capability against North Korean missiles on alert by the end of this month.

"We say to those tyrants who believe they can blackmail America and the free world - you fire, we're going to shoot it down," he said at a campaign stop in Ridley, Pennsylvania, on Aug. 17.

But all eight of the system's intercept tests, the last of which failed in December 2002, have fallen far short of replicating realistic war scenarios, experts inside and outside the government have said. Of the total, five have succeeded in highly scripted conditions, never at night or in severe weather.

Philip Coyle, the Pentagon's chief weapons tester under former president Bill Clinton (news - web sites), described as wrong-headed any decision to declare the so-called ground-based midcourse system operational, or GMD, operational at this stage after Wednesday's failure.

"Premature declaration of operational status could mislead the Congress and U.S. taxpayers that they are being protected by the GMD system, when they are not," he said in an e-mail.

To develop the system, the Missile Defense Agency has planned 20 or 30 more flight intercept tests, each different from the next, before it will be ready for "realistic operational testing," Coyle said.

"If these 20 or 30 tests each take two years, like the latest test, it could be 50 years before the GMD system will be ready" for deployment," he said. "And this assumes they all succeed. If some fail, as this latest test did, it could take even longer," Coyle added.

"The more one thinks about the test, the more incredible it is that it failed," said Wade Boese, research director of the Arms Control Association, a private Washington-based group that favors reduced spending on the project.

"The Pentagon had two years essentially to prepare ... and publicly described it in a way to guard against any chance that it could be deemed a failure," he said.

Unlike the botched mission early Wednesday, the last full flight test had as its chief goal to shoot down its target. It misfired on Dec. 11, 2002, when the warhead -- a "kill vehicle" meant to obliterate a mock warhead by slamming into it -- failed to separate from its booster rocket.

Neither the Missile Defense Agency nor the Pentagon responded immediately to questions about the failure's impact on the deployment timetable.

Boeing Co., the Pentagon's prime contractor on the project, also declined comment.

The Pentagon has already suggested its schedule is slipping.

"I'm not constrained by timing, exactly," Michael Wynne, the Pentagon's chief weapons buyer, said on Dec. 8 in reply to a question about switching the system on. "But we'll see how (the test) goes and then we'll see from there."

[KWhit]

"We say to those tyrants who believe they can blackmail America and the free world - you fire, we're going to shoot it down," he said at a campaign stop in Ridley, Pennsylvania, on Aug. 17.

Or not.

[sachmo71]

Apparently, shooting down a missile is hard GD work.
You would think the launch and separation would be the relatively easy part.

[flere-imsaho]

Hey, as long as the tanks don't succumb to pikemen I'll be happy.

[Fonzie]

Hey, at least we now have missiles that can shut themselves down when they detect "anomalies."

That technological advance alone was easily worth $130 billion.

[Arles]

By this logic, NASA and the entire space program never should have been started as well. There were collassol failures and big money (at the time) spent on Satellite and rocket technology decades back. A big chunk of our current technology we use today is a bi-product of "wasted money" back in the early days of NASA.

[Fonzie]

Originally Posted by Arles

By this logic, NASA and the entire space program never should have been started as well. There were collassol failures and big money (at the time) spent on Satellite and rocket technology decades back. A big chunk of our current technology we use today is a bi-product of "wasted money" back in the early days of NASA.

Exactly. Eventually I hope to see this technology translated into toasters that will sense bread "anomalies" and stop toasting before the bread burns.

Call me a dreamer, but maybe someday we'll get there...

[Kodos]

Originally Posted by Fonzie

Exactly. Eventually I hope to see this technology translated into toasters that will sense bread "anomalies" and stop toasting before the bread burns.

Nice one, Fonzie!

[Raiders Army]

As a part of the testing for the PAC-3 missile, I would remind you that testing is far more rigorous than actual combat. We missed with our test firings, but engaged with the first successful PAC-3 engagement during the war.

Also, when ICBMs are travelling at over MACH 25, they are somewhat difficult to hit.

[Franklinnoble]

Originally Posted by Raiders Army

As a part of the testing for the PAC-3 missile, I would remind you that testing is far more rigorous than actual combat. We missed with our test firings, but engaged with the first successful PAC-3 engagement during the war.

Also, when ICBMs are travelling at over MACH 25, they are somewhat difficult to hit.

Not to be confused with the PAC-10 missile...

[sterlingice]

Originally Posted by Fonzie

Exactly. Eventually I hope to see this technology translated into toasters that will sense bread "anomalies" and stop toasting before the bread burns.

Call me a dreamer, but maybe someday we'll get there...

I second Kodos kudos.

SI

[Tigercat]

Originally Posted by flere-imsaho

Hey, as long as the tanks don't succumb to pikemen I'll be happy.

Sometimes its the tanks fault for being a mounted unit. I think too many Palestinians have played civ 1 or 2 and are convinced that their rocks can bring down armored units eventually.

I miss the day when we hoped to laser missles to death. If you are gonna dream, at least dream the coolest dream you can dream.

[randal7]

Originally Posted by flere-imsaho

Hey, as long as the tanks don't succumb to pikemen I'll be happy.

This made me laugh out loud.

[Samdari]

Originally Posted by Tigercat

I miss the day when we hoped to laser missles to death. If you are gonna dream, at least dream the coolest dream you can dream.

Uhh, that project is still ongoing.

http://www.boeing.com/defense-space/...abl/flash.html

[Galaril]

Maybe this is the problem with this project................................................................

Head Scientist/Engineer:

[flere-imsaho]

Originally Posted by randal7

This made me laugh out loud.

Thanks. I'm working off my bad karma from the other political threads.

[miked]

Is this the same thing as that "Star Wars" BS they were working on in the 80s and 90s? It seems by the time we get this system to work, it will be obsolete or something. Just simply because missile warfare seems to be evolving very rapidly.

[Runtheball]

$130 Billion is nothing compared to the final pricetag for this system. Remember so far it is in the design and testing phase (which obviously is nowhere close to being complete). Assuming that the technology is demonstrated effective (someday), deployment of a system like this will bring the cost to over a trillion.

And the system will do nothing to stop an enemy from shipping a nuke into the country on a cargo container, or just detonating one onboard a ship in any of our major harbors.

But despite this I would argue that the "missile defense system" is performing its intended task beautifully. That intended task is to generate a crapload of income for the defense industry, and for the defense industry to cycle a fraction of a crapload of that money back into the political campaigns of the politicians that are pushing for missile defense.

[bbor]

Worse failure?


The Canadian missle defence system

[Maple Leafs]

Originally Posted by bbor

Worse failure?


The Canadian missle defence system

Canadian missle defence = assuming people would rather shoot their missles at the US instead.

[Ryche]

I don't know, I think our ability to rain a couple hundred nukes down on a nation compared to each one they shoot at us is a pretty good missile defense in itself.

[dacman]

Topper!

http://www.russianspaceweb.com/r16_disaster.html