Missile Defense and the Tests
What does the North Korean nuclear test have to do with missile defense? According to House Majority Leader John Boehner, quite a bit. The AP reports:
House Majority Leader John Boehner, R-Ohio, accused Democrats of standing in the way of work on a missile defense program. "It is now clear that such a position would weaken America's national defense and put Americans in danger," he said.
This is, quite simply, nonsense.
For starters, Democrats abandoned any substantial opposition to missile defense nearly five years ago. It is also almost certain that North Korea cannot reach the United States with an ICBM, making yesterday’s nuclear test largely irrelevant to national missile defense. (There are other reasons to invest something in missile defense, but yesterday’s events aren’t among them.) Boehner may think he’s scoring political points, but all he does is raise unfounded fears that they could be targets of North Korean missiles tomorrow.
While many Democrats have altered their stance on missile defense as part of their political posturing to claim to strength on national security, many work each year to slash critical funding for the program. Just this June, Sen. Levin moved to cut off funds for the Ground-based Midcourse Defense system - precisely that which would protect the U.S. homeland from a long-range North Korean missile.
While intelligence estimates vary on North korea's ability to reach the U.S. with a long-range missile, it is false to argue that yestarday's events don't merit investing in missile defense. Without dispute, North Korea demonstrated disregard for the entire international community and continued unpredictable and destabilizing behavior. Missile defense is a powerful tool in insuring our security and that of our allies against an increasingly well armed and unstable regime.
October 10, 2006 10:32 AM | Reply | Permalink
Too many missile defense discussions assume there is only one kind of defense. Most of the discussions focus on national ballistic missile defense (NBMD), of which one type is the midcourse kinetic kill system with launchers at Ft. Richardson and Vandenberge AFB.
Much of the time, theater ballistic missile defense (TBMD), of which there operational Navy and Army versions that cover somewhat different situations, and an Air Force airborne laser system still in development -- yet can deal with other scenarios including ICBM boost phase. The theater systems tend to be strategically stabilizing and far more flexible than NBMD.
There are even some short-range systems, co-developed with Israel, that can engage things from a SCUD, potentially down to GRAD/Katyusha rockets. These include the Arrow anti-missile missile, and the Tactical High Energy Laser. Gun systems may have a point defense role; I believe Israel is testing one based on Swedish 35mm automatic cannon, and Metal Storm is exploring this area. Some years ago, the US was evaluating a gun system for point defense of ICBM silos.
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Howard
*equal opportunity offense to both extremes*
October 10, 2006 10:50 AM | Reply | Permalink
I'm no fan of missle defense, which seems to me to provide unrealistic grounds for confidence if implemented. But the absence of an NK intercontinental ballistic missle isn't by itself an argument against research. They have missles that can reach Toyko and Seoul (though I don't know if they are nuclear-capable), and it seems to me that the only reason to go forward with this kind of research would be to offer protection to our allies there.
Incidentally, I saw this quote in the Times, given by an unnamed DPRK official to the Yonhap News Agency in China:
Pure bluster, but nonetheless an interesting turn of phrase.
October 10, 2006 11:59 AM | Reply | Permalink
Again, differentiate between theater and national. Japan is acquiring the TBDM version of the Standard missile for its Burke-class destroyers, which can engage NK missiles. Standard has shown better performance than the Ft. Richardson NBMD system.
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Howard
*equal opportunity offense to both extremes*
October 10, 2006 12:33 PM | Reply | Permalink
Missile defense is a powerful tool in insuring our security and that of our allies against an increasingly well armed and unstable regime. Listerman
Missile defense is a huge black hole for pork barrel spending. Ted Postol link, MIT has proven it could never work. Regardless, any regime that sent a missile up would of course leave a 'return address' and be turned into a radioactive parking lot. It would be self-assured destruction of the 'rogue regime'. America would be more at risk for an untraceable suitcase nuke.
October 16, 2006 6:32 PM | Reply | Permalink
This would be the same missile defense system that sucked down umpteen billions of dollars and has failed every single test?
This is the same missile defense which faces technical obstacles which are likely to be forever insurmountable because they involve pinpoint performance well beyond the ranges of error.
This is the same missile defense that would take twenty years or more to come on line if ever, and then be good only for a handful of missiles.
This is the same missile defense that would be relatively easy to overwhelm, fool with decoys, evade, or crack.
So what is missile defense actually good for? I'll tell you.
It's good for spending billions and billions of dollars to protect America against Imaginary missiles.
No imaginary missile will ever strike America while missile defense is in place.
Listen, I've got an offer for youse guys. Slip me thirty million, I'll protect America from imaginary missiles myself. I'll use imaginary heat vision, or imaginary super breath, both 100% imaginary guaranteed. Real money required though.
In a generation, intercontinental ballistic missile defense will go down on the historical record as one more proof that America was the dumbest richest country on Earth.
Used to be Holland and the Tulips. But you've got them beat.
October 25, 2006 11:21 AM | Reply | Permalink
I quite agree with defunding Ground-based Midcourse Defense, as it has a terrible track record against a low-probability threat. I have no objection to continuing to fund AEGIS SM-3 TBMD, which has succeeded in every test and would have a chance of hitting a NK missile in boost phase from a coastal launcher, or Army PATRIOT PAC-3 for terminal defense, or advancing the Air Force Airborne Laser, which has better boost-phase intercept capability.
I'd also repurpose that money for specific national security programs, such as risk reduction for the chemical industry (why smuggle chemical weapons when they are rolling on the railroads), covert bioterrorism surveillance that would work best with universal access to health care, hardening the national electrical power grid against even larger versions of Ohio Valley 2003, and many other things I consider a much higher risk than a NK ICBM.
I'm not opposed to spending money on cost-effective defenses and plausible threats. Midcourse Defense is not among these. If you think otherwise, I would be perfectly willing to have a technical discussion here, and compare the benefits of that system against others that are underfunded. Cutting funds to the Centers for Disease Control, with the biological threats available, was insane.
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Howard
*equal opportunity offense to both extremes*
October 25, 2006 12:19 PM | Reply | Permalink