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US Missile Defense Test Fails
KingRobot sends news that a recent test of a US missile defense system has failed. The test of the Groundbased Midcourse Defense interceptor apparently had a problem with the sea-based X-band radar. Both the target missile, launched from the Pacific, and the interceptor, launched from California, performed as expected. "Yesterday's test was intended to quell doubters of the entire missile-defense approach, with the target missile deploying countermeasures. Critics of the GMD programme say that tests thus far, which have not included such spoilers, have been too kind to the intercept tech. The [military] isn't disclosing whether the intercepting kill vehicle had simply failed to reach the 'threat cluster' of warhead(s) and decoys, or whether it had reached the cluster but hit a countermeasure rather than the actual target."
Actually, you're wrong.
In the first place, the Patriot missiles were only partially successful. Since they weren't intended for the purpose of defending large areas, that is acceptable, and they've been improved since them. But the Patriot missiles are a short range defense.
There have been previous successful tests. A simple google search turned up the following:
Reuters
Military Defense Agency
Heritage Foundation
Funny you should mention that. The effectiveness of Patriots in Gulf War I is hotly contested.
Both sides rely on subjective arguments about what constitutes a "successful intercept", neither have any hard data on how many (if any) Scuds were actually downed, and the folks that were having the Scuds aimed at them said that they were getting through pretty well, so I'd have to conclude that the preponderance of evidence is that Patriot was a propaganda weapon in Gulf War I.
I should note that plenty of money has been thrown at defence contractors since then, and there's certainly no technical reason why AMBs can't work. It's just that nobody has shown that they do.
If you were blocking sigs, you wouldn't have to read this.
Maybe we should spend a little more money on literacy and math, since you fail at both.
... your ass will follow.
US medical spending is over $2.5 trillion http://www.medpagetoday.com/PublicHealthPolicy/Washington-Watch/13016
US defense spending is $685 billion http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Military_budget_of_the_United_States
Free your mind
I know everyone is freaking out about how missile defense is defective by design and this proves their greatest concerns. However, go look up Aegis BMD/SM3, which is one of the other missile defense programs. It's the most successful program so far, having something like 12/15 successful flight tests. And not all the tests are hand-holding exercises, including the satellite shoot-down, which was remarkable since SM3 was not designed for that. I believe THAAD has also had some recent, successful flight tests too. In fact, I'm pretty sure GMD is the one missile defense program that hasn't had any successful tests. I don't know why we still give Boeing money.
*sigh*
A mere decade ago, I'd have laughed at your statement. Today? I almost agree with you - and I'm a US citizen! Bush changed things an awful lot when he launched that preemptive war on Iraq. Afghanistan, not so much, but Iraq certainly.
"Windows is like the faint smell of piss in a subway: it's there, and there's nothing you can do about it." - Charlie Br
Please don't tell me you believe that bullshit. Look it is really simple, If I am in little pissant country A, and launch a couple of nukes at big heavily armed country B, I just painted a big ass bullseye right on the dead center of my country C that will soon be a nuclear dead zone D.
The leaders of those countries may be douchebags, but they ain't stupid. if you have enough brains to develop nukes then you will have heard of the MAD doctrine which would be even more devastating to a little country like Iran or N Korea due to the fact that the amount of nukes they would be hit with in retaliation would be MUCH more powerful and much nastier than what they launched at the US, Russia, or China. Not to mention to keep from being downwind I'm sure China would roll on N Korea and bring the pain if it even looked like they were getting ready to launch.
No, this is just another excuse to cut really fat checks to defense contractors for worthless shit, ala the F22, which was designed to fight an enemy we no longer had and such lovely problems like the computers fucking up if you crossed a timezone with it. If we spent just 1/4th of this on our troops for pay raises, better gear, and for training interpreters we would be MUCH better off than pouring money down this rat hole. This is just TARP for the defense industry.
ACs don't waste your time replying, your posts are never seen by me.
Two decades and what have we got to show for it? A bunch of rich industrialists. We've needed to cut spending for decades, let us start here. There won't be much to defend if the government taxes us to death to pay for these useless toys.
Blar.
Actually, the reason the Japanese did not rapidly surrender immediately after Hiroshima is more complex. Bureaucratic inertia insured a pretty slow response. (The leaders did not even meet for two days following the attack, and debated the issue for half the day) The Emperor himself had been pushing for peace for some time following the Japanese defeat at Okinawa, but the Allied insistence on unconditional surrender, as well as political subterfuge by Stalin (who played on Japanese hopes of Soviet assistance while preparing his own attack against Japan), fed fire to an already heated debate among Japanese leaders. In an all-too-familiar story, political infighting prevented the country from taking prompt, sensible action.
Not to mention that the entire system could be disabled by detonating a nuke at apogee ten minutes or so before your attack missile comes over.
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