Free Republic

(Reuters) - The Obama administration is leaving open the possibility of giving Moscow certain secret data on U.S. interceptor missiles due to help protect Europe from any Iranian missile strike. A deal is being sought by Washington that could include classified data exchange because it is in the U.S. interest to enlist Russia and its radar stations in the missile-defense effort, a Pentagon spokeswoman said Tuesday in written replies to Reuters. No decision has been made yet on whether the United States would offer data about the interceptors' "velocity at burnout," or VBO, said Air Force Lieutenant Colonel April Cunningham,...

<p>The United States will deploy SM-3 interceptor missiles in Poland between 2015 and 2018 under its plan to defend NATO allies in Europe from possible Iranian attack, a Polish official said on Thursday.</p> <p>The interceptors, which target short- and medium-range ballistic missiles, are part of President Barack Obama's revamped missile defence system.</p>

WASHINGTON (AP) - An experimental interceptor missile failed to get off the ground in a test of the U.S. national missile defense system early Wednesday, raising new doubts about prospects for the imminent activation of the system. In the test, a target missile, a simulated ICBM with a mock warhead, was launched without problem from Kodiak, Alaska, at 12:45 a.m. EST, a statement from the Defense Department's Missile Defense Agency said. However, 16 minutes later, an "unknown anomaly" led to an automatic shutdown of the interceptor missile shortly before it was to launch from the Ronald Reagan Test Site at...

WASHINGTON (AP) - U.S. missile defense systems may not have faced testing rigorous enough to ensure they would work during an attack, said a congressional study released Friday. The report, prepared by the General Accounting Office, an investigative arm of Congress, calls for the military to conduct more realistic testing before making the systems operational. The first of a series of interceptor missiles, designed to shoot down intercontinental ballistic missiles launched by North Korea or other belligerents, are expected to be ready by the end of the year. A spokesman for the military's Missile Defense Agency disputed aspects of the...