[blam]

"Two Navy Aegis warships are patrolling near North Korea as part of the global missile defense and would be among the first sensors that would trigger the use of interceptors, the officials said yesterday."

Notice that this didn't say US Navy. I read yesterday that the Japanese had to Aegis destroyers out off the coast and said that if the missile were launched, they'd shoot it down. Can an Aegis bring that thing down?

[edpc]

Yes it can. Go to www.mda.mil and check it out. Lots of information on the various stages in which the missile can be intercepted. The Aegis can take it in the Mid Course or Terminal Phases.

[Stonewall Jackson]

Just last month, the USS Lake Erie successfully intercepted a ballistic missile during the final seconds of its flight.

[finnman69]

yup, an Aegis SM-3 did it this year

[TexasPatriot8]

That would likely depend on the altitude of the ICBM and if the Aegis ships had an "angle of attack" on the missle when their SAM intercepts were in range.

I hadn't heard this mentioned, but is it not also true that F-15 and F-22s are easily capable of the altitude and speeds required to get in the air and intercept ICBMs and destroy them with their own AAMs, Sparrows and AMRAAMS, or even the heavy "Pegasus" anti satellite missiles? I think that should be very possible once the missle is in it's downward arc. That kind of missle does travel sub sonic, and a squadron of super sonic fighters firing super sonic AAMs could defintiely shoot down even a handful of ICMS, especially considering from North Korea, any ICMB would come within range of fighters in Alaska on their way towards the Continental U.S.. This is what I am thinking just based on my knowledge of U.S. military equipment. I may be wrong though, so someone please correct me if i am. But I think that would work and surely if I can think of it, it's part of the strategy to protect the U.S. from ICMB attack.

Again, just my opinion, but this is where the F-14 could come in really handy with it's Phoenix missiles and radar system. The Phoenix has a hundred mile range, is super sonic, and nearly fool proof. A flight of four F-14D's with two Phoenix's missiles each, and the rest of the palettes loaded with external fuel tanks, at mach 2+ could get into position pretty quick at over 60,000 feet, and launch one or more Phoenix at an ICBM/s. They wouldn't all miss and in that case the worst case scenario would be that the warheads would deatonate over water, which would sure be preferable than over an American city. Odds are they wouldn't deatonate because of damage from the AAM hit, and if they didn't fall into water too deep to ever recover, the Navy would get them for certain. Any thoughts? I doubt this will happen but it would certainly be a great use for the F-14D Tomcats that have been retired from Naval service. :)