Posted on 05/19/2010 2:47:44 AM PDT by ErnstStavroBlofeld
When the New York Times covers a weapons program we tend to take note, in part because they do so it so rarely. And when they put it on the front page, above the fold, we take even more note. The Times did just that this morning, trumpeting a tale about how a veteran missile defense sceptic at MIT, Ted Postol, and a Cornell University colleague, George Lewis, performed an analysis of SM-3 tests and came away convinced that the system does not work very well.
Now my first reaction was deep skepticism. After all this has appeared to be the one major anti-missile system that has performed pretty well and even shot down a dead NRO spy satellite. But I’m not possessed of the sort of math skills and years of experience that Postol has, or that the congressional aides who follow missile defense possess have. So I contacted the Hill aides since Postol can boast of the very impressive feat of having accurately skewered the Patriot missile system during the first Gulf War at a time when it was being showered with praise by everyone, including the president of the United States.
The Hill reaction was, at best, muted. One of the best informed aides put it this way: “I think in the end that SM-3 will work. The test process is going slowly, some of which is by design. MDA has probably oversold it at this point, but it is a much more successful test program than the GBIs. Postal is right to be vigilant, but [MDA Director Lt. Gen. Patrick] O’Reilly is a lot more methodical, technical and cautious than his predecessor,” the aide said.
(Excerpt) Read more at dodbuzz.com ...
A diss-heartening article for sure
Just another salvo in the propaganda war. It works, too.
Didn't that used to be a News Section, before it became the Opinion Section?
The MDA pretty well skewers the NYT article as being fact-free. No surprise there.
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