ANOTHER MISSILE OFFENSE TEST

On Wednesday, May 15 the Pentagon's Missile Defense Agency (MDA) ran another test of its Standard Missile-3 (SM-3) interceptor.  The agency said the test was a success.

The dummy (target) missile was launched from the Navy's Pacific Missile Test Range Facility on Kauai, Hawaii.  The SM-3 interceptor missile was fired from a Navy Aegis cruiser (USS Lake Erie).  The MDA's cost for the test was $32 million (not counting the costs to the Navy).

The SM-3 interceptor missiles cost between $12-15 million each.  The follow-on version of these missiles will double in price.

The Navy currently has SM-3 interceptor missiles on 26 ships with plans to place them on 36 ships by 2018.  These "missile defense" systems are being used today to surround Russia and China.  Their role in military strategy is to serve as the "shield" to take out Russian or Chinese nuclear retaliatory strikes after a US-NATO first-strike attack.

Last fall Russian Deputy Prime Minister Dmitry Rogozin said, "This missile defense concept is global and mobile, and it creates unpredictability...the [US] fleet will invariably appear in our northern seas [Baltic, Barents, and Bering Seas]... The radius of use of these weapons makes them a real threat to us."

China has expressed similar fears as Obama's "pivot" of 60% of US naval forces into the Asia-Pacific destabilizes the region.  More ports are needed for these warships thus we see the pressure to build the new base on Jeju Island in South Korea and talks with Vietnam, Philippines, and other nations about allowing US access to their bases.