Text Fwd: Japan, Missile tests in collaboration with the United States 일본, 미국과 공동으로 하와이에서 미사일 방어 요격 실험, 10월 28일

* Image source: Stars and Stripes, Oct. 29, 2010

'In this image provided by the U.S. Missile Defense Agency a Standard Missile – 3 is launched Thursday from the Japanese destroyer JS Kirishima in a joint missile defense intercept test with the Missile Defense Agency in the mid-Pacific. The U.S. and Japanese militaries said Thursday the JS Kirishima fired an interceptor missile that shot down a separating medium-range missile target about 100 miles above the Pacific Ocean.
U.S. Missile Defense Agency/The Associated Press'
*Image source: DMZ Hawai'i 카우아이, 니하우, 카울라 섬
*See also
[국문 번역][Site Fwd: DMZ Hawai’i] Presentation given at the International Conference For a Nuclear Free, Peaceful, Just and Sustainable World [With Map]
비핵, 평화, 정의, 지속가능한 세계를 위한 국제회의 하와이 발표문[지도 함께]
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Stop NATO

Global Security Newswire
October 28, 2010
Japan to Test Missile Interceptor

Japan is set today to test a missile defense system in collaboration with the
United States, Reuters reported (see GSN, Oct. 15).

The flight-intercept trial near Hawaii is intended to demonstrate Japan's readiness to properly field a Raytheon Standard Missile 3 Block 1A interceptor against a medium-range ballistic missile target, the U.S. Missile Defense Agency said.

The Japanese destroyer JS Kirishima has been outfitted with defense contractor Lockheed Martin's Aegis ballistic missile defense system. It is one of six Japanese battleships to be supplied with the technology....

The missile interceptor test is expected to confirm "the ability of the Japan Aegis BMD system to monitor and report ballistic missile track information and assess the ability of the Japan Aegis BMD system to plan a BMD mission in tactical situations," the Pentagon branch said.
....
Japan is working with Washington on preparing a bigger and more advanced
interceptor -- the SM-3 Block 2A -- which could be fielded in approximately
eight years (Jim Wolf, Reuters, Oct. 28).

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Stop NATO
Hawaii: Pentagon Tests Sea-Based Missile Interception
Thu Oct 28, 2010

Hawaii News Now
October 28, 2010
Missile defense system testing to take place on Kauai

KAUAI: On Kauai, the Pacific Missile Range Facility plans to test its missile defense system Thursday.

The Navy will fire a rocket from land out to sea, and a Japanese war ship will try to intercept it.

The launch time is not revealed to any of the participants to simulate a real world scenario.
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Blog site

Text fwd: US Navy To Launch Missile Shield Command

* informed in StopNATO*

* Image source/ caption*
Same as the original article

'Navy A Standard Missile 3 is launched from the cruiser Lake Erie in 2007 during a joint Missile Defense Agency and Navy ballistic missile flight test. Chief of Naval Operations Adm. Gary Roughead announced the coming formation of the Navy Air and Missile Defense Command during a speech before a business group March 4.'

http://www.navytimes.com/news/2009/03/navy_bmd_command_031609w/
Navy Times, March 16, 2009
CNO announces new missile defense command
By Andrew Scutro

Next month the Navy will establish a new command with missile defense in mind.

Adm. Gary Roughead, chief of naval operations, announced the coming formation of the Navy Air and Missile Defense Command during a speech before a business group Wednesday night in Northern Virginia.

“We’ll formally stand it up in April, but it will be the place where the Navy comes to bring together the thinking, the ideas, the concept, the intellectual effort for our air and ballistic missile initiatives, efforts and programs so that we can stay in the forefront of this important mission area,” Roughead told the group.

He said it will be based in Dahlgren, Va. — where the Navy has an existing facility — though further details about the new command were not readily available Wednesday night.

Tensions over ballistic missile launches have risen in recent weeks....Adm. Timothy Keating, head of U.S. Pacific Command...was quoted saying, “If a missile leaves the [North Korean] launch pad, we’ll be prepared to respond upon direction of the president.”

The Navy has had several successful ship-launched intercepts of test ballistic missiles. As of November, Navy shot 19 interceptor missiles at speeding targets and was successful in 16 attempts.

The Nov. 1 test was the first “fleet operational firing.” After two target missiles were fired from the Pacific Missile Range Facility on Kauai, Hawaii, an SM-3 fired from the destroyer Paul Hamilton directly hit the first. Another ship, the destroyer Hopper, failed to intercept the second target missile.

The Missile Defense Agency, which oversees the military’s BMD programs, has also been testing land-based interceptor systems.

The Navy’s Aegis BMD program is directed by Rear Adm. Brad Hicks.

By upgrading existing Aegis radar systems and training ship crews to intercept airborne ballistic missiles, the Navy has been bolstering the usefulness of its older Flight I/II Burke-class destroyers, as well as some of its Ticonderoga-class cruisers.

There are six BMD-capable ships homeported in Pearl Harbor: the cruiser Lake Erie and destroyers Russell, Paul Hamilton, O’Kane and Hopper. The BMD-capable cruiser Port Royal ran aground Feb. 5, suffering extensive damage that will cost millions to repair.

Five are based out of Yokosuka, Japan: the cruiser Shiloh and destroyers John S. McCain, Stethem, Fitzgerald and Curtis Wilbur. Homeported in San Diego are the destroyers Decatur, Milius, Benfold, Higgins and John Paul Jones. Destroyers Stout and Ramage are the two Norfolk-based BMD-capable warships.

Roughead spoke at a meeting of the Fredericksburg Regional Chamber of Commerce Military Affairs Council. Also scheduled to speak was Rep. Robert Wittman, R-Va., following the showing of a film on ballistic missile defense.
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