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Pentagon Testers Show Declining Confidence in U.S. Missile Defense Capabilities This Year
Testing of rudimentary U.S. missile defenses fielded in Alaska and California “suggests” that they “may have some inherent defensive capability” against missiles launched from North Korea, according to this year’s installment of an annual Defense Department testing office report (see GSN, Dec. 6, 2005). The report issued last year expressed more confidence in missile defense, saying the system “should have some limited capability,” Bloomberg reported today. “From a ‘limited capability’ to ‘may have some inherent capability’ means it’s an on-paper capability,” said Steven Hildreth, missile defense analyst for the Congressional Research Service. “But in terms of real-world data, we don’t have it.” “With time and money, they will get it, but the only question is: Will it take a year, or two or 50?” Hildreth said. Report author David Duma, Pentagon acting director of operational test and evaluation, said the Missile Defense Agency’s plan to test all missile components before resuming intercept tests is “prudent” (see GSN, Jan. 12). “Flight testing has been delayed while corrective measures are implemented,” the assessment says. The agency “will restore confidence in the system through a series of basic and progressively more challenging flight tests, culminating in an intercept attempt,” it adds. The agency said in a statement that it has responded to the report “by appropriately restructuring test program objectives to emphasize fundamentals and gradually increasing complexity this year” (Tony Capaccio, Bloomberg News/Arizona Daily Star, Jan. 20).
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