By David Ruppe
Global Security Newswire

WASHINGTON — Although U.S. military officials and independent analysts have praised the track record of the Patriot theater missile defense system during the conflict in Iraq, a senior U.S. Army official said today an analysis is not yet completed on the success rate (see GSN, April 16).

The U.S. Central Command is conducting an analysis of the Patriot record and the results will be released as soon as they are available, said Lt. Gen. Joseph Cosumano, director of the Army Space and Missile Defense Command.

Speaking at an event sponsored by the National Defense University Foundation and the National Defense Industrial Association, he repeated a previously reported Army statement that the system had successfully “engaged” nine Iraqi missiles fired within the range of deployed Patriot systems during the war.

The engagements were determined successes based on the fact that none of those Iraqi missiles destroyed anything, Cosumano said.

“The commander in the field says it was apparently effective because there was nothing damaged,” he said.

That calculation, however, does not take into account the possibility that the missiles could have been poorly aimed or inaccurate and may have simply missed their targets.

“The data is being collected right now as we speak,” he said.

The engagements “appeared to be effective because of new sources of data that we have,” he said, including ship-based radar.  “We’re sorting through all of that data now to give the scientific answer as to how effective Patriot was.”

The Boston Globe on April 16, citing a Central Command official, reported that eight of the missiles were “destroyed in the air,” while the other was “significantly damaged” and landed without causing harm.

During the 1991 Persian Gulf War, the Army estimated a high success rate for an early version of the Patriot missile defense system, which was later shown to be incorrect.  In the recent war, U.S. forces used a combination of older Patriots and an upgraded system called Patriot Advanced Capability 3.

Cosumano also said a separate investigation was underway to determine the cause or causes of three incidents in which Patriot batteries engaged friendly aircraft (see related GSN story, today).

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