Programme
In February 2009 Iran demonstrated its mastery of multi-stage rocket technology by orbiting a satellite, a sign that its industry was capable of producing an intercontinental-range ballistic missile (ICBM). Three months later, a North Korean launch attempt failed to orbit a satellite, but within weeks that country was threatening to test an intercontinental-range ballistic missile.
No nation views these threats more seriously that the US, but in its first defence budget the new Obama administration refocussed US missile-defence programmes, concentrating on what it saw as the most promising projects, while sidelining several that had been started under the Bush administration. There is a growing emphasis on systems that can defeat the short-term ballistic-missile threat.
Although the US Missile Defence Agency can point to a long series of successful interceptions of ballistic-missile targets, opponents of ballistic missile defence believe that such tests do not reflect operationally realistic scenarios; easily engineered countermeasures would allow a hostile missile to avoid being engaged, they argue. Some have even suggested that early trials were faked, with the target broadcasting its current location and course to the system being used to attack it.
Hosted by Jane’s Missiles and Rockets, this 60 minute presentation will focus on -
- The long-range ballistic missile threat posed by countries such as North Korea and Iran
- Potential solutions to the problem – boost-phase, mid-course and terminal-phase weapons
- The 2009 US decision to restructure its missile-defence programmes
- The main US ballistic-missile defence programmes – GBMD, Aegis BMD, & THAAD
- Alternative approaches –ABL, KEI and MKV
- Why Russia and China oppose US missile-defence deployments
- The viability of potential countermeasures