Sea-Based Missile Defense “Hit to Kill” Intercept Achieved (Aeigis)

MDA.Mil ^ | June 22, 2007 | Not specified

[RDTF]

Lieutenant General Henry A. ‘Trey” Obering, Missile Defense Agency (MDA) director, announced the successful completion today of MDA’s latest “hit to kill” intercept flight test conducted jointly with the U.S. Navy off the coast of Kauai, Hawaii. This was the 28th successful intercept in 36 missile defense tests since 2001.

The test involved a “separating” target, meaning that the target warhead separated from its booster rocket. The event, designated as Flight Test Standard Missile -12 (FTM-12), marked the ninth successful intercept in eleven flight tests for the Aegis Ballistic Missile Defense Program, the sea-based component of the Agency’s Ballistic Missile Defense System (BMDS), designed to intercept and destroy short to medium-range ballistic missiles. All target launches managed by the Missile Defense Agency’s Targets and Countermeasures directorate to support the Aegis Ballistic Missile Defense System have been successful.

This flight mission was the third intercept involving a separating target and the first time an Aegis BMD-equipped destroyer was used to launch the interceptor missile. The USS Decatur (DDG 73), using the operationally-certified Aegis Ballistic Missile Defense Weapon System (BMD 3.6) and the Standard Missile – 3 (SM-3) Block IA missile successfully intercepted the target during its midcourse phase of flight.

[RDTF]

.pdf alert

[RDTF]

sorry for the mis-spell - it’s Aegis

[TexasCajun]

This was the 28th successful intercept in 36 missile defense tests since 2001.

That would include July 17, 1996, TWA-800

...just prior to Slicks re-election.

[meandog]

Aegis BMD is the hope of the future and the best that we’ve got! Because more than two-thirds of the world is ocean, it should be possible to park an Aegis CG or DDG off the coast of any hostile country with ICBMs and catch them in boost phase off the launchers.

[Logophile]

A hit-to-kill capability certainly is an impressive achievement. But one thing I have never understood: Why not also use an explosive, fragmentation warhead, just to be sure?

[RexBeach]

You know, I love the military, but sometimes announcements like this make a mite nervous.

My question: How difficult was this test of the system? Was it as realistic as it could have been? And is a 78% success ratio something to get excited about here?

Anyone?

[hamboy]

What if Slick administration admitted the missle intercept had accidentally shot down TWA800? See http://www.alamo-girl.com/03681.htm

[TexasCajun]

[TexasCajun]

I think Sandy Burglar was after something to do with TWA-800 when he when he stole domuments from the National Archive.

[TChris]

My question: How difficult was this test of the system? Was it as realistic as it could have been? And is a 78% success ratio something to get excited about here?

These announcements indicate progress in the technology. Nobody is declaring the system a finished, developed platform.

I'm very pleased to see such progress. It makes fighting with the USA a much more expensive, and uncertain, proposition.

[RexBeach]

Thanks, TChris!

[redlegplanner]

My limited understanding is that the target warhead is moving faster than would the exploding fragments from a HE detonation. Nuke interceptor would be a different story...

[studly hungwell]

“My limited understanding is that the target warhead is moving faster than would the exploding fragments from a HE detonation. Nuke interceptor would be a different story...”

You are not nearly as cynical about this as I am. (After all, the exploding fragments would be headed toward the missile, not chasing it.)

It is my belief that the “hit to kill” concept was mandated by the Clinton White House in the belief that it could not be made to work. That way, he could say he was doing something on missile defense, but not actually do anything that would lead to a deployable system.

Fortunately for all of America, our engineers are a lot smarter than he was.

[Lonesome in Massachussets]

Lethality.

They want to put as much kinetic energy on the WH as possible.

I still favor boost phase interception, way most bang for the buck.

[meandog]

That would include July 17, 1996, TWA-800 ...just prior to Slicks re-election.

PUh-leeeze, do you REALLY believe that a cruiser full of "Sailors" could keep a secret almost 11 years old? Believe me, if TWA-800 had been shot out of the sky by a Standard Missile on an Aegis crusier, the "sea story" about it would get around the fleet faster than a Manilla Bay prostitute.

[MSF BU]

The problem is, does it work if dozens or hundreds of missiles are launched at once against the fleet? Just a question, but I've read in numerous publications that this would be the Chinese strategy that they'd have the Iranians test for them in the Persian Gulf, supplying the hardware of course.

For the Chinese, worst case they learn their systems are not effective. Best case, they cause massive losses to our nave and can blame it on Iran.

[TexasCajun]

The theory that Jack Cashill puts forward is that a terrorist purchased private jet was filled with explosives to produce a manned suicide 'missile'.

The pilot 1st targeted a small commercial flight but decided to pass on it and lines himself up with a "big" jet coming from JFK, TWA-800

The Clinton WhiteHouse was on high-elert due to earlier attacks overseas and a terrorist communique about an upcoming attack on US soil.

There were 3 submarines in the area, and a P3 surveillance plan tracking the terrorist plane and watched as is passed on the smaller jet and now tracked a collision course with TWA800.

One US missile hit the right wing of TWA-800 and seconds later, a 2nd US Missile hit the terrorist plane loaded with explosives and that explosion ripped the plane in two.

Slick signed an executive order in the first days of the investigation that rescinded the Navy from the Federal Whisle-Blowers Act.

Not one single eyewitness testified during public hearings.

Sounds like tinfoil hat time, but remember this was months before Slicks re-election and he sure couldn't have a terrorist attack upset his re-election bit.

[hamboy]

Yes I it was downed by missile. It was easy to acknowledge an Iranian Airbus mistakenly shot down by USS Vincennes. Slicky was already plagued with all sort of headache at the time. Mounting lawsuits and lawsuits against the U.S. government could still be ranging, he might have lost re-election.

[RDTF]

So true. Anyone that believes that we shot down our own plane, and that have been able to keep it quiet needs major psych help just like the buffoons that think we orchestrated 9/11.
And anyway, isn’t this thread about our successful ABM test?

[meandog]

The Clinton WhiteHouse was on high-elert due to earlier attacks overseas and a terrorist communique about an upcoming attack on US soil. There were 3 submarines in the area, and a P3 surveillance plan tracking the terrorist plane and watched as is passed on the smaller jet and now tracked a collision course with TWA800. One US missile hit the right wing of TWA-800 and seconds later, a 2nd US Missile hit the terrorist plane loaded with explosives and that explosion ripped the plane in two. Slick signed an executive order in the first days of the investigation that rescinded the Navy from the Federal Whisle-Blowers Act. Not one single eyewitness testified during public hearings. Sounds like tinfoil hat time, but remember this was months before Slicks re-election and he sure couldn't have a terrorist attack upset his re-election bit.

Put more tin foil on that hat because:

1. P-3 Aircraft from NAS Brunswick don't track planes; they are submarine hunters and, being a former submariner, I don't ever recall being 30,000 feet OVER instead of UNDER the surface of the sea.

2. In order to fire its missile, the Aegis cruiser would have had to be a battle stations with the 1-MC announcing "this is not a drill" so, question, why isn't there AT LEAST one voice out there leaking this fact?

3. Also, the ship's C.O. would have certainly been in contact with higher ups for CYA purposes, again no one at CINCLANTFLT or the Pentagon, or the former administration has ever acknowledged anything.

Sorry, I'm no Clinton fan, but the guy couldn't even keep a BJ he had in the Oval Office quiet so I'm not buying that he could keep the lid on such a fantastic event. Flight 800 was either a victim of early terrorism (a la shoe bomber practice) or a malfunction. --------------------------------------------------------------------------------