I have previously posted on the Obama admin's decision not to place ground-based interceptors in Poland, here, and here and here.
Bottom line: Technically good decision, politically, not so much.
Like Information Dissemination, and a couple of Senators (Reed, D-RI and McCain, RINO-AZ) I wondered whether this decision meant more BMD shooters for the Navy.
Well, the Vice Chairman of the JCS doesn't know (read ID's post for details).
Which leads me to this conclusion on this decision - not only did the O admin handle this in an amateurish way from an international politics perspective (read my previous posts), but now we know they really don't have a plan to actually make this dream happen by building more BMD ships and manning them.
END.
Showing posts with label ballistic missile defense. Show all posts
Showing posts with label ballistic missile defense. Show all posts
Sunday, September 27, 2009
Saturday, September 19, 2009
Missile Defense - Ultimately Unprotected
The Weekly Standard blog has some insight into the NIE that the Obama administration is using to justify delaying (until the 2020's) a long-range missile defense system based in Europe to protect from Iranian ICBM's.
You may recall, the administration has chosen not to deploy long-range interceptors in Poland with their radars in the Czech Republic. The NIE does push out the time when the Iranians are expected to have a long-range ICBM capability from 2015 to 2020, but, the Standard correctly points out that the administration's land-based SM3 capability is not planned until after 2020, thus, we will go defenseless for some period from 2020 (when the current NIE predicts the threat develops) until some time after 2020 when the land-based SM3 variant becomes operational in Europe.
So, while we have a better technical decision against the current threat, we have actually probably made ourselves more vulnerable against the future threat.
To those who say things like "The reversal of the National Missile Defense strategy today exposes the blundering strategy of the previous adminstration," I say, dig a little deeper.
End...
You may recall, the administration has chosen not to deploy long-range interceptors in Poland with their radars in the Czech Republic. The NIE does push out the time when the Iranians are expected to have a long-range ICBM capability from 2015 to 2020, but, the Standard correctly points out that the administration's land-based SM3 capability is not planned until after 2020, thus, we will go defenseless for some period from 2020 (when the current NIE predicts the threat develops) until some time after 2020 when the land-based SM3 variant becomes operational in Europe.
So, while we have a better technical decision against the current threat, we have actually probably made ourselves more vulnerable against the future threat.
To those who say things like "The reversal of the National Missile Defense strategy today exposes the blundering strategy of the previous adminstration," I say, dig a little deeper.
End...
Thursday, September 17, 2009
Bam to Poles, Czechs: See the back of my hand (Caution: Navy angle)
I have previously given kudos to the Bam admin for their continuation of Bush policies in India and Africa (despite Hillary Clinton making an ass of herself on her Africa tour and being upbraided over AGW by the Indian PM, Obama spent some time giving a good government lecture to African audiences).
However, today, the administration returned to either their incompetent or nefarious ways by agreeing with the Russians that we don't need a missile defense system based in Poland and The Czech Republic. Seeing as those are the most freedom-loving countries in Eastern Europe, I guess it's apropos that Obama would side with his Russian mentor, Vlad Putin, on this one.
The administration demonstrated their incompetence by making this announcement on the anniversary of the Soviet invasion of Poland in 1939. Talk about bad timing.
However, there is certainly a technical argument to be made that this is the right choice, and the quickest way to get interceptors in place to counter the growing Iranian threat, is to go for a sea-based and mobile ground based solution, vice the planned system. Since this system will rely more on Aegis ships, armed to the gills with interceptors, maybe it'll lead to more ships for our Navy (don't count on it). But, since the Aegis system and our SM3 is proving to be a pretty capable solution, I think in toto, it makes some sense.
Still, there is something to be said for NOT slapping your staunchest European allies around, and not smacking them on a day with historical significance like today. Also, since the system may yet lead to defenses in one/both of these countries, couldn't we have done something like send an Aegis cruiser over there for a symbolic port call? And, why not extract some serious, and public, concession from the Russians?
Hmmmmm????
end...
However, today, the administration returned to either their incompetent or nefarious ways by agreeing with the Russians that we don't need a missile defense system based in Poland and The Czech Republic. Seeing as those are the most freedom-loving countries in Eastern Europe, I guess it's apropos that Obama would side with his Russian mentor, Vlad Putin, on this one.
The administration demonstrated their incompetence by making this announcement on the anniversary of the Soviet invasion of Poland in 1939. Talk about bad timing.
However, there is certainly a technical argument to be made that this is the right choice, and the quickest way to get interceptors in place to counter the growing Iranian threat, is to go for a sea-based and mobile ground based solution, vice the planned system. Since this system will rely more on Aegis ships, armed to the gills with interceptors, maybe it'll lead to more ships for our Navy (don't count on it). But, since the Aegis system and our SM3 is proving to be a pretty capable solution, I think in toto, it makes some sense.
Still, there is something to be said for NOT slapping your staunchest European allies around, and not smacking them on a day with historical significance like today. Also, since the system may yet lead to defenses in one/both of these countries, couldn't we have done something like send an Aegis cruiser over there for a symbolic port call? And, why not extract some serious, and public, concession from the Russians?
Hmmmmm????
end...
Friday, July 31, 2009
Navy continues string of successful BMD tests...
And they said it couldn't be done (must've assumed the USAF would get this mission).
The Navy successfully fired an SM-3 from the USS Hooper (CG-70), proving to the North Koreans that we intend to protect Hawaii.
From the Navy's official release:
"During this event, entitled Stellar Avenger, the Aegis BMD-equipped ship, USS Hopper (DDG 70), detected, tracked, fired and guided a Standard Missile-3 (SM-3) Block (Blk) IA to intercept a sub-scale short range ballistic missile."
end...
The Navy successfully fired an SM-3 from the USS Hooper (CG-70), proving to the North Koreans that we intend to protect Hawaii.
From the Navy's official release:
"During this event, entitled Stellar Avenger, the Aegis BMD-equipped ship, USS Hopper (DDG 70), detected, tracked, fired and guided a Standard Missile-3 (SM-3) Block (Blk) IA to intercept a sub-scale short range ballistic missile."
end...
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