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 North Korean nuclear threat

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happy jack




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PostSubject: North Korean nuclear threat   North Korean nuclear threat Empty3/8/2013, 11:13 am

edge:

Either the White House is lying, or your janitor buddy from Argonne National Laboratory is full of shit.
Which is it?





http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/U/US_US_NKOREA?SITE=AP&SECTION=HOME&TEMPLATE=DEFAULT&CTIME=2013-03-07-17-01-56

Mar 7, 7:44 PM EST

WHITE HOUSE: US CAN DEFEND AGAINST NKOREA ATTACK

BY MATTHEW PENNINGTON AND JOSH LEDERMAN
ASSOCIATED PRESS



WASHINGTON (AP) -- The U.S. is fully capable of defending itself against a North Korean ballistic missile attack, the White House said Thursday, after Pyongyang threatened a pre-emptive nuclear strike on the United States.
The threat from the North Koreans came ahead of a unanimous vote in the U.N. Security Council approving its toughest sanctions yet on the North in response to an atomic test last month.
North Korea has escalated its bellicose statements this week as the tightening of U.N. sanctions loomed. It has also threatened to scrap the cease-fire that ended the 1950-53 Korean War.
"I can tell you that the United States is fully capable of defending against any North Korean ballistic missile attack," said White House spokesman Jay Carney.
………
It is difficult to know how capable U.S. missile defense is, should it be required.
Carney alluded to the development of U.S. system designed to defend against long-range missiles. He said the U.S. is on a "good trajectory" after success in its return to testing of the Ground-Based Interceptor.
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edge540

edge540


Posts : 1165

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PostSubject: Re: North Korean nuclear threat   North Korean nuclear threat Empty3/8/2013, 3:10 pm

I don't have a janitor buddy at the Argonne National Lab. You dream that up?
Voices in your head?
Not to worry, you don't have to hide under your bed just yet, jack.
Quote :
Pyongyang, though, must still prove a number of additional ICBM capabilities -- namely precision targeting and a re-entry vehicle that can survive the trip back through the atmosphere. Missile experts say these capabilities must be demonstrated multiple times for North Korea to derive any military confidence in a strategic deterrent.

“It’s one thing to send it up. It’s another thing to bring it back down where you want it to come down,” said military space expert Victoria Samson of the Secure World Foundation. “Right now their rockets to this point, to be kind, have been fairly inaccurate,” she said in an interview. “They’re lucky they can get them off the ground much less hit the broadside of a barn.”

Additionally, the North must be able to build nuclear warheads small enough to be mounted on a missile as well as an ICBM large enough to carry such a heavy payload. Neither capability has yet been seen.

The Unha 3 “can't carry enough payload to be of any significant threat. … It's a baby satellite launcher, and not a very good one at that,” David Montague, former president of Lockheed Martin Missile Defense Systems, said earlier this fall.

http://www.nti.org/gsn/article/north-korea-rocket-launch-breakthrough-strategic-missile-program/

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Artie60438




Posts : 9728

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PostSubject: Re: North Korean nuclear threat   North Korean nuclear threat Empty3/8/2013, 8:50 pm

edge540 wrote:
I don't have a janitor buddy at the Argonne National Lab. You dream that up?
Voices in your head?
Probably just started drinking early thanks to this:February Jobs Report: U.S. Economy Adds 236,000 Jobs; Unemployment Rate Down To 7.7
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happy jack




Posts : 6988

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PostSubject: Re: North Korean nuclear threat   North Korean nuclear threat Empty3/9/2013, 11:22 am

edge540 wrote:
I don't have a janitor buddy at the Argonne National Lab. You dream that up?
Voices in your head?


Yes, edge - below is what the "voices in my head" told me to "dream up". I could probably find more examples, but I don't want to overload the bandwidth.
So, I'll ax you again: Is the White House lying, or are you and Argonne Boy simply full of shit?




edge540 wrote:
Thanks jack. :mrgreen:
Quote :
Advisers to U.S. President-elect Barack Obama have said he favors missile defense in principle but the program, a flagship policy of the Bush administration, will face more scrutiny after he takes office.

That's great, given that Ronnies wet dream has wasted over 100 billion.

Quote :
President George W. Bush has been spending roughly $10 billion a year on all aspects of missile defense, the Pentagon's costliest annual outlay for an arms development program.
Back in 2000 George promised us a system that would be operational by 2004.
Here it is almost 2009 & they're still "working on it"....too funny.

And of course never mind North Korea & Iran don't have any ICBM's

edge540 wrote:
My Neighbor friend across the street is an engineer-physicist who works at Argonne National Laboratory & one of the projects that he & his team have been working on along with engineers & physicists at M.I.T. for the last 15 years off & on, is the "decoy problem" associated with the missile defense program.
He's told me that they're not any closer to solving the problem now than they were 15 years ago.

Quote :
The U.S. military conducted a successful test of its system built to knock out long-range missiles that could be fired by North Korea or Iran, the Pentagon said on Friday.
Given the fact that the Pentagon has a long history & a track record of lying, I'm afraid I really don't pay to much attention to their claims.
Ask Jessica Lynch or Pat Tillmon's mother

happy jack wrote:
edge540 wrote:
My Neighbor friend across the street is an engineer-physicist who works at Argonne National Laboratory & one of the projects that he & his team have been working on along with engineers & physicists at M.I.T. for the last 15 years off & on, is the "decoy problem" associated with the missile defense program.
He's told me that they're not any closer to solving the problem now than they were 15 years ago.

It’s comforting to know that the people working on our missile defense system are so willing to part with inside information on their progress, or lack thereof, but what’s really amazing is that they’re willing to tell edge the Plumber about it.

edge540 wrote:
jack, if the "decoy problem" was anywhere near close to being solved, the people at the Pentagon would be more than willing to tell you & everybody else on the planet.
They would be jumping up & down, yelling & doing cartwheels at news conferences.

And there is nothing "amazing" about Tony telling me about the lack of progress.
He didn't tell anything that I already didn't know.

edge540 wrote:
I have no problem with defense systems & weapons that actually WORK.

I do have a problem with wasting billions on "make work, corporate welfare" boondoggles.

Quote :
Still, critics contend that the vast missile-defense program has mainly been a boondoggle for defense firms, with many cost overruns and delays. They peg the cost of the entire system since the Reagan administration at more than $160 billion.

Criticism increased in recent years as the Pentagon conducted tests of the interceptor, with mixed results. The military launched a Minuteman ballistic missile, acting as a dummy enemy warhead, toward the Marshall Islands in the western Pacific. Prototype interceptors were then fired from the islands, knocking out the “enemy” missiles five out of eight times.

But critics say the tests were rigged. The targets were often equipped with homing devices that provided information an enemy would never provide, to help the interceptor spot it. Pentagon officials insist the homing devices were necessary to test the interceptor’s guidance systems.

“It’s taken billions of dollars from other defense and homeland security priorities, and it doesn’t work,” said Philip Coyle, a former Pentagon chief for testing and evaluating weapons. “We’re deploying a system that doesn’t work and hasn’t been adequately tested.”

http://articles.latimes.com/2004/aug/16/business/fi-silo16

edge540 wrote:
"Technical analysis by the Union of Concerned Scientists and others has shown that the U.S. system could be defeated by decoys and other countermeasures that could be developed by any country that could build a long-range missile. The September 1999 U.S. National Intelligence Estimate on foreign missile developments also concluded that countries would have the technologies needed to deploy these countermeasures."

translation for the ignorant:

It will not work.

It's a waste of money.

edge540 wrote:
jack, get back to me when they launch a test ICBM that's 6,000 mile away, not knowing the time of launch & the trajectory, with decoys, WITHOUT a homing beacon & intercept the dummy warhead successfully.

Good luck.

Quote :
Might not work using 1999 technology, but this is almost 2009.

...and it still doesn't work, never will.

happy jack wrote:
edge540 wrote:
My Neighbor friend across the street is an engineer-physicist who works at Argonne National Laboratory & one of the projects that he & his team have been working on along with engineers & physicists at M.I.T. for the last 15 years off & on, is the "decoy problem" associated with the missile defense program.
He's told me that they're not any closer to solving the problem now than they were 15 years ago.

Quote :
The U.S. military conducted a successful test of its system built to knock out long-range missiles that could be fired by North Korea or Iran, the Pentagon said on Friday.

edge:
Isn’t it really, really amazing how technology became so advanced in just the few weeks since the Messiah took office that we are now able to destroy incoming missiles? I mean, prior to January 20th, 2009, missile defense was just the pipe dream of Reagan, that senile old warmonger, just some goofy Star Wars fantasy held exclusively by Republicans. Yet, almost overnight, the Messiah has made it possible.
I am in awe.
Awe, I tell you.
(By the way, what does Argonne Boy have to say about this?)



http://abcnews.go.com/International/story?id=6965611&page=1

[size=150]U.S. Ready to Respond to N.Korea Missile [/size]

Admiral Keating Tells ABC News U.S. Prepared to Shoot Down Missile If Obama Gives OK

By MARTHA RADDATZ and LAUREN SHER
Feb. 26, 2009


In an exclusive interview with ABC News' Martha Raddatz, Adm. Timothy Keating, head of the U.S. Pacific Commands, said that the military is prepared to shoot down any North Korean ballistic missile -- if President Obama should give the order.
"If a missile leaves the launch pad we'll be prepared to respond upon direction of the president," Keating told ABC News. "I'm not a betting man but I'd go like 60/40, 70/30 that it will, they will attempt to launch a satellite. There's equipment moving up there that would indicate the preliminary stages of preparation for a launch. So I'd say it's more than less likely."
"Should it look like it's not a satellite launch -- that it's something other than a satellite launch -- we'll be ready to respond."
Intelligence reports suggest that North Korea is preparing a long-range missile test. Earlier this week, North Korea announced its plans to send a satellite into orbit as part of its space program.
However, many in the international community assert that North Korea's satellite test is simply a means of concealing a long-range missile test -- a move that would flare existing tension in the region.
Keating said that the military is ready to respond with at least five different systems: destroyer, Aegis cruiser, radar, space-based system and ground-based interceptor. All of these work in conjunction with one another to protect against any missile threat.
Destroyers are fast, multi-purpose warships that can be used in almost any type of naval operation. They would likely play a defensive role, helping to repel an air attack and offering a platform for gunfire and missiles to hit airborne objects.
The Aegis cruiser is part of the Navy's computer-based command and control system that integrates radar and missiles to fight against land, air and sea attacks. For Keating, the Aegis combat system can tracks threats and counter any short- or medium-range missiles.
Radars vary in type and design, but the military would likely employ a range of sea-based and early warning radars to detect the presence of a North Korean missile, track warheads' movement and more easily home in on the position of a missile to knock it down.
Space-based infrared system is a defense system that provides warning of any missile launches, detecting the threat and employing other tools to obliterate it.
Ground-based interceptor is a weapon that seeks and destroys incoming ballistic missiles outside of the earth's atmosphere. Its sensors give the military the ability to locate and obliterate a North Korean missile.
"We will be fully prepared to respond as the president directs," Keating said. "Everything that we need to be ready is ready. So that's ready twice in one sentence, but we're not kidding, it doesn't take much for us to be fully postured to respond."
In the U.S. arsenal is a "very sophisticated and complex, but effective ballistic missile-defense system," Keating says, which would provide a line of attack against any kind of ballistic missile or warhead that springs from a North Korean launch pad.
Ground-based interceptors, he says, will be able to take down an object other than a satellite. And while they have not moved ships into place yet, Keating says he is prepared to do so at a moment's notice.
Experts say that North Korea's announcement of its satellite launch is an attempt to put Pyongyang on President Obama's radar.
"It's a fairly stern test early of President Obama and his administration," Keating said.
We're intentionally being a little more cautious and a little more reserved as to not stimulate unnecessary activity in North Korea," he said. "We want to do no harm, if you will."
Nevertheless, Keating says that his priority first and foremost is defending the United States.
"If that means we detect a missile that is a threat to U.S. territory, then we are going to defend U.S. territory. And [if] we hit what we're aiming at that should be a source of great confidence and reassurance to our allies and partners."


happy jack wrote:
edge540 wrote:

The "decoy problem" still exists, they're not any closer to solving the problem now than they were 15 years ago.

If a N. Korean warhead is accompanied with decoys, that would present a big problem that hasn't been solved yet & probably never will.
The only way we could shoot it down is during the Boost Phase using the sea-based Aegis cruiser.

And yes, a national missile defense IS just the pipe dream of Reagan, that senile old warmonger, & still is a goofy Star Wars fantasy held exclusively by Republicans.
So, if the Messiah gives the order to shoot down a missile with technology that doesn't exist, does that mean that He is extremely gullible, hence unfit to make the decisions of a Commander-inChief?
Or does it mean that He is simply a liar, hence unfit to be the Commander-in-Chief?
Pick one.

edge540 wrote:
Don't worry jack, Barry is not going to give an order to shoot down a N Korean satellite or a long-range missile test.
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edge540

edge540


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PostSubject: Re: North Korean nuclear threat   North Korean nuclear threat Empty3/11/2013, 8:34 am

jack,
obvioulsy the voices and dreams in your head did tell you I had a "janitor buddy" at Argonne when in reality my buddy is an engineer-physicist at Argonne.

Quote :
Isn’t it really, really amazing how technology became so advanced in just the few weeks since the Messiah took office that we are now able to destroy incoming missiles? I mean, prior to January 20th, 2009, missile defense was just the pipe dream of Reagan, that senile old warmonger, just some goofy Star Wars fantasy held exclusively by Republicans. Yet, almost overnight, the Messiah has made it possible.
No jack, the technology did not become more advanced. Now read this very slowly so you can undestand it, because it's very simple.
There still is no technology that will intercept ICBM's with multiple warheads and decoys.
If you were not so ignorant and clueless you would know that North Korea does not have any ICBM's with multiple warheads and decoys meaning that it is possible we can shoot down one or two primitive Noth Korean warheads....IF everything works like it should. Nobody is lying.
It's the Russians and Chinese that have ICBM's with multiple warheads, decoys and even the capability to change course in mid flight. In other words there is no missile defense system that has the capability to shoot down Russian and Chinese ICBM's with
M.I.R.V. warheads. Got it?

It's still a Ronnie Reagan goofy Star Wars fantasy.

Quote :
(By the way, what does Argonne Boy have to say about this?)

He says you don't know WTF what you're talking about and you're full of shit.





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happy jack




Posts : 6988

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PostSubject: Re: North Korean nuclear threat   North Korean nuclear threat Empty3/11/2013, 4:24 pm

edge540 wrote:
jack,
obvioulsy the voices and dreams in your head did tell you I had a "janitor buddy" at Argonne when in reality my buddy is an engineer-physicist at Argonne.

Quote :
Isn’t it really, really amazing how technology became so advanced in just the few weeks since the Messiah took office that we are now able to destroy incoming missiles? I mean, prior to January 20th, 2009, missile defense was just the pipe dream of Reagan, that senile old warmonger, just some goofy Star Wars fantasy held exclusively by Republicans. Yet, almost overnight, the Messiah has made it possible.
No jack, the technology did not become more advanced. Now read this very slowly so you can undestand it, because it's very simple.
There still is no technology that will intercept ICBM's with multiple warheads and decoys.
If you were not so ignorant and clueless you would know that North Korea does not have any ICBM's with multiple warheads and decoys meaning that it is possible we can shoot down one or two primitive Noth Korean warheads....IF everything works like it should. Nobody is lying.
It's the Russians and Chinese that have ICBM's with multiple warheads, decoys and even the capability to change course in mid flight. In other words there is no missile defense system that has the capability to shoot down Russian and Chinese ICBM's with
M.I.R.V. warheads. Got it?

It's still a Ronnie Reagan goofy Star Wars fantasy.

Quote :
(By the way, what does Argonne Boy have to say about this?)

He says you don't know WTF what you're talking about and you're full of shit.








edge540 wrote:
"Technical analysis by the Union of Concerned Scientists and others has shown that the U.S. system could be defeated by decoys and other countermeasures that could be developed by any country that could build a long-range missile. The September 1999 U.S. National Intelligence Estimate on foreign missile developments also concluded that countries would have the technologies needed to deploy these countermeasures."

translation for the ignorant:

It will not work.

It's a waste of money.
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edge540

edge540


Posts : 1165

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PostSubject: Re: North Korean nuclear threat   North Korean nuclear threat Empty3/12/2013, 8:34 am

edge540 wrote:
Pyongyang, though, must still prove a number of additional ICBM capabilities -- namely precision targeting and a re-entry vehicle that can survive the trip back through the atmosphere. Missile experts say these capabilities must be demonstrated multiple times for North Korea to derive any military confidence in a strategic deterrent.

“It’s one thing to send it up. It’s another thing to bring it back down where you want it to come down,” said military space expert Victoria Samson of the Secure World Foundation. “Right now their rockets to this point, to be kind, have been fairly inaccurate,” she said in an interview. “They’re lucky they can get them off the ground much less hit the broadside of a barn.”

Additionally, the North must be able to build nuclear warheads small enough to be mounted on a missile as well as an ICBM large enough to carry such a heavy payload. Neither capability has yet been seen.

The Unha 3 “can't carry enough payload to be of any significant threat. … It's a baby satellite launcher, and not a very good one at that,” David Montague, former president of Lockheed Martin Missile Defense Systems, said earlier this fall.


http://www.nti.org/gsn/article/north-korea-rocket-launch-breakthrough-strategic-missile-program/

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happy jack




Posts : 6988

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PostSubject: Re: North Korean nuclear threat   North Korean nuclear threat Empty3/12/2013, 3:22 pm

edge540 wrote:
edge540 wrote:
Pyongyang, though, must still prove a number of additional ICBM capabilities -- namely precision targeting and a re-entry vehicle that can survive the trip back through the atmosphere. Missile experts say these capabilities must be demonstrated multiple times for North Korea to derive any military confidence in a strategic deterrent.

“It’s one thing to send it up. It’s another thing to bring it back down where you want it to come down,” said military space expert Victoria Samson of the Secure World Foundation. “Right now their rockets to this point, to be kind, have been fairly inaccurate,” she said in an interview. “They’re lucky they can get them off the ground much less hit the broadside of a barn.”

Additionally, the North must be able to build nuclear warheads small enough to be mounted on a missile as well as an ICBM large enough to carry such a heavy payload. Neither capability has yet been seen.

The Unha 3 “can't carry enough payload to be of any significant threat. … It's a baby satellite launcher, and not a very good one at that,” David Montague, former president of Lockheed Martin Missile Defense Systems, said earlier this fall.


http://www.nti.org/gsn/article/north-korea-rocket-launch-breakthrough-strategic-missile-program/




Whether or not North Korea is a threat is not the issue.
The issue is: If North Korea is indeed a threat, can their missile be brought down harmlessly, as the White House claims, or is such a thing impossible, as you claim?
Clearly, one of the parties involved is full of shit; I'm just trying to ascertain which one it is.
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Scorpion

Scorpion


Posts : 2141

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PostSubject: Re: North Korean nuclear threat   North Korean nuclear threat Empty3/12/2013, 9:07 pm

happy jack wrote:
Whether or not North Korea is a threat is not the issue.
The issue is: If North Korea is indeed a threat, can their missile be brought down harmlessly, as the White House claims, or is such a thing impossible, as you claim?
Clearly, one of the parties involved is full of shit; I'm just trying to ascertain which one it is.

Yeah. Well I believe that Edge has already provided the answer to your question...

edge540 wrote:
If you were not so ignorant and clueless you would know that North Korea does not have any ICBM's with multiple warheads and decoys meaning that it is possible we can shoot down one or two primitive Noth Korean warheads....IF everything works like it should. Nobody is lying.

BTW - Our Navy could probably even use the Aegis Combat System to take down a missile, especially a missile that is still in its ascent stage. IIRC, we considered doing just that during the North Korean missile test at the end of 2012.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aegis_Combat_System


In short, there's "nothing to see here," Jack. As Edge correctly indicated, "nobody is lying."

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happy jack




Posts : 6988

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PostSubject: Re: North Korean nuclear threat   North Korean nuclear threat Empty3/13/2013, 3:15 am

Scorpion wrote:

In short, there's "nothing to see here," Jack.

That’s where you’re wrong – there’s plenty to see here. The mere mention of missile defense puts edge’s Reagan Derangement Syndrome on display and in full bloom, causing him to splutter and piss and moan about “St. Ronnie”, the “senile warmonger”.
It warms my heart, I tell you.
I’m just surprised that edge enjoys living in the 1980s – I’ve always considered it a somewhat bland decade.
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edge540

edge540


Posts : 1165

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PostSubject: Re: North Korean nuclear threat   North Korean nuclear threat Empty3/13/2013, 7:55 am

Thanks Scorpion.

I was going to ask jack if he's dense, pretending to be dense or just illiterate, but now I don't have to.

Or maybe it's that conservatives really do have a hard time understanding science.

Get that ice bag out jack.
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Artie60438




Posts : 9728

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PostSubject: Re: North Korean nuclear threat   North Korean nuclear threat Empty6/15/2014, 11:16 am

edge540 wrote:
jack,
obvioulsy the voices and dreams in your head did tell you I had a "janitor buddy" at Argonne when in reality my buddy is an engineer-physicist at Argonne.

Quote :
Isn’t it really, really amazing how technology became so advanced in just the few weeks since the Messiah took office that we are now able to destroy incoming missiles? I mean, prior to January 20th, 2009, missile defense was just the pipe dream of Reagan, that senile old warmonger, just some goofy Star Wars fantasy held exclusively by Republicans. Yet, almost overnight, the Messiah has made it possible.
No jack, the technology did not become more advanced. Now read this very slowly so you can undestand it, because it's very simple.
There still is no technology that will intercept ICBM's with multiple warheads and decoys.
If you were not so ignorant and clueless you would know that North Korea does not have any ICBM's with multiple warheads and decoys meaning that it is possible we can shoot down one or two primitive Noth Korean warheads....IF  everything works like it should. Nobody is lying.
It's the Russians and Chinese that have ICBM's with multiple warheads, decoys and even the capability to change course in mid flight. In other words there is no missile defense system that has the capability to shoot down Russian and Chinese ICBM's with
M.I.R.V. warheads. Got it?

It's still a Ronnie Reagan goofy Star Wars fantasy.

Quote :
(By the way, what does Argonne Boy have to say about this?)

He says you don't know WTF what you're talking about and you're full of shit.
Indeed!
$40 billion missile defense system proves unreliable
Quote :


With a convulsive rumble, followed by billowing flames and exhaust, a sleek 60-foot rocket emerged from its silo at California's Vandenberg Air Force Base.

It was a test of the backbone of the nation's missile defense system. If North Korea or Iran ever launched nuclear weapons against the United States, the interceptors at Vandenberg and remote Ft. Greely, Alaska, would be called on to destroy the incoming warheads.

Scientists conducting the test at Vandenberg on Sunday, Jan. 31, 2010, had left little to chance. They knew exactly when the target missile would be launched from an atoll in the Marshall Islands 4,900 miles away. They knew its precise dimensions, expected trajectory and speed.

Based on this and other data, they had estimated the route the interceptor's heat-seeking "kill vehicle" would have to follow to destroy the target.

Within minutes, the interceptor's three boosters had burned out and fallen away, and the kill vehicle was hurtling through space at 4 miles per second. It was supposed to crash into the mock enemy warhead and obliterate it.

It missed.

At a cost of about $200 million, the mission had failed.

Eleven months later, when the U.S. Missile Defense Agency staged a repeat of the test, it failed, too.

The next attempted intercept, launched from Vandenberg on July 5, 2013, also ended in failure.

The Ground-based Midcourse Defense system, or GMD, was supposed to protect Americans against a chilling new threat from "rogue states" such as North Korea and Iran. But a decade after it was declared operational, and after $40 billion in spending, the missile shield cannot be relied on, even in carefully scripted tests that are much less challenging than an actual attack would be, a Los Angeles Times investigation has found.

The Missile Defense Agency has conducted 16 tests of the system's ability to intercept a mock enemy warhead. It has failed in eight of them, government records show.

Despite years of tinkering and vows to fix technical shortcomings, the system's performance has gotten worse, not better, since testing began in 1999. Of the eight tests held since GMD became operational in 2004, five have been failures. The last successful intercept was on Dec. 5, 2008. Another test is planned at Vandenberg, on the Santa Barbara County coast, later this month.

The GMD system was rushed into the field after President George W. Bush, in 2002, ordered a crash effort to deploy "an initial set of missile defense capabilities." The hurried deployment has compromised its effectiveness in myriad ways.

"The system is not reliable," said a recently retired senior military official who served under Presidents Obama and Bush. "We took a system that was still in development — it was a prototype — and it was declared to be 'operational' for political reasons.
I am confident that the kill vehicle will work. But we have yet to prove that. - Lt. Gen. Henry A. Obering III, former Missile Defense Agency director

"At that point, you couldn't argue anymore that you still needed to develop and change things. You just needed to build them."

Dean A. Wilkening, a physicist at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory in Livermore, Calif., offered a similar assessment. Wilkening served on a National Academy of Sciences panel that issued a 2011 report on missile defense.

GMD remains a "prototype system" that "has performed less well than people had hoped," he said at a May 28 policy conference in Washington, D.C. "If you're going to rely on that as an operational system, one shouldn't be too surprised that it does tend to fail more than you'd like."

At a separate conference this month, Wilkening called the system's test record "abysmal."
cComments

The Times interviewed missile defense scientists and current and former Defense Department officials, and reviewed thousands of pages of congressional testimony and reports by the Government Accountability Office, the Pentagon's independent testing office, the National Academy of Sciences and the Defense Science Board.

Official pronouncements about the GMD system, The Times found, have overstated its reliability.

Early on, the Pentagon's chief weapons buyer told Congress he had high confidence an attack could be foiled by firing one to three missiles at each enemy warhead.

Under that scenario, "the effectiveness would be in the 90% range," Defense Undersecretary Edward C. "Pete" Aldridge Jr. told the House Armed Services Committee in 2003.

Navy Adm. Timothy J. Keating, then head of the U.S. Northern Command, was even more emphatic when he told the Senate Armed Services Committee in 2007: "I appear before you today as confident as I know how to be in the employability and efficacy of that system."

With a convulsive rumble, followed by billowing flames and exhaust, a sleek 60-foot rocket emerged from its silo at California's Vandenberg Air Force Base.

It was a test of the backbone of the nation's missile defense system. If North Korea or Iran ever launched nuclear weapons against the United States, the interceptors at Vandenberg and remote Ft. Greely, Alaska, would be called on to destroy the incoming warheads.

Scientists conducting the test at Vandenberg on Sunday, Jan. 31, 2010, had left little to chance. They knew exactly when the target missile would be launched from an atoll in the Marshall Islands 4,900 miles away. They knew its precise dimensions, expected trajectory and speed.

Based on this and other data, they had estimated the route the interceptor's heat-seeking "kill vehicle" would have to follow to destroy the target.


With a convulsive rumble, followed by billowing flames and exhaust, a sleek 60-foot rocket emerged from its silo at California's Vandenberg Air Force Base.

It was a test of the backbone of the nation's missile defense system. If North Korea or Iran ever launched nuclear weapons against the United States, the interceptors at Vandenberg and remote Ft. Greely, Alaska, would be called on to destroy the incoming warheads.

Scientists conducting the test at Vandenberg on Sunday, Jan. 31, 2010, had left little to chance. They knew exactly when the target missile would be launched from an atoll in the Marshall Islands 4,900 miles away. They knew its precise dimensions, expected trajectory and speed.

Based on this and other data, they had estimated the route the interceptor's heat-seeking "kill vehicle" would have to follow to destroy the target.
system."
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