U.S. missile defense maturing, latest test a success (Reuters)

[Eugene]

U.S. missile defense maturing, latest test a success

By Andrea Shalal-Esa

2 hours, 5 minutes ago

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Within a year, the U.S. missile defense system should be able
to guard against enemy attacks, while testing new technologies, the deputy director
of the U.S. Missile Defense Agency said on Monday.

-snip-

O'Reilly said there would be no formal announcement that the system was operational.
He predicted the capability to defend against enemy missiles and to continue testing
and development work would be achieved within a year.

"It's just a matter of maturation," he told reporters after a speech hosted by the
George C. Marshall Institute, a public policy group.

-snip-

On Saturday, the Terminal High Altitude Area Defense (THAAD), built by Lockheed Martin
Corp, intercepted a target shot from a barge. It was the first test of THAAD since its
move to the Pacific Missile Range Facility in Hawaii.

-snip-

Full article: http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20070130/ts_nm/missile_usa_dc_1

Related: Successful Missile Defense Intercept Test Takes Place Off Hawaii - SpaceWar.com

[Warren Stupidity]

1. Probably bullshit.

However if in fact the idiots have been able to cobble together an actual functional missile attack system then all they will have accomplished is a restart of the weapons race part of the cold war. The relatively cheap circumvention systems will be deployed before we can get our hugely expensive missile attack system operational. We will then have a big fat maginot line. Good for bidness, bad for the future of civilization on this planet and the atomic scientist's doomsday clock will no doubt be moved a bit closer to midnight. The ironic part of this is that as we have chosen the big end of the expense balance sheet in this particular game, we are likely to do to ourselves what we did to the former soviet union: inadvertently bankrupt our system into failure.

[AndyTiedye]

2. Did They Still Have to Put a Radio Beacon on the Target so the Missile Could Find It?

[soothsayer]

3. Uh-huh. Shurrrrrrr it is. I'll believe it when I see it.

[lvx35]

4. I wonder if this about China testing that missile.

It would suck to get in a super missile contest with China...Mostly because I think China would cheat; they would pretend to be developing new technologies, while they were actually just using their WalMart production plants to make 15,000 copies of their original anti-satellite missle at $5 a pop, knowing that if they shot them all, enough would get through. ;)