By Raul Colon
April 26th 2010
Embolden by their success in the 2008 United States’ Presidential elections, the newly inaugurated Administration of Barrack Obama made the cancellation of the Pentagon’s plans for the deployment of the Third Site Ground Based Missile Defense System in Eastern Europe a top priority.
Citing skyrocketing costs, the need to reproach Russia and the lack of a substantial threat profile, Obama and his national security team announced last autumn the termination of one of former President George W. Bush signature items.
In the spring of 2009, Administration officials began discussing the idea of engaging Iran, which along with North Korea; represent the most clearing ballistic missile threat of our lifetime. Low level communications, including cultural exchanges, the first step towards partial normalization of relationships, began in April 2009.
By the time (May) the US Defense Department (DOD) published its first-ever comprehensive Ballistic Missile Defense Review (BMDR), the writing was on the wall regarding a profound shift in America’s policies towards the most populated Middle East nation. The Review states, unambiguously, that Iran is moving towards acquiring the capability of reaching the homeland within a recent time. It cites the development of the Safir Space Launch Vehicle (SLV)-2 in February 2009 as one clear step of which direction the country is headed. But it came short of predicting when the Islamic nation will have the capability of deploying missiles capable of reaching America’s coast.
“Looking ahead, it is difficult to predict precisely how the threat to the US homeland will evolve…Iran and North Korea has yet to demonstrate an ICBM-class warhead”, stated the much discussed study. Further more, the paper was suspect of Iran’s ability to field but just a few operational systems this decade, thus the threat was downgraded.
The study’s conclusion tends to validate Washington’s new position.
The Review called for the termination of all ground-based missile interceptor activities in Europe shifting their designed mission to the recently upgraded Aegis Ship Based Missile Defense System and its Standard Missile 3 (SM3) package. The SM3 envelop was designed for theater warfare. A tactical weapon upgraded to perform semi-strategically missions, the SM3 was a good ‘in-range’ weapon, but not the kind of system a nation should relay on to defend its territorial integrity.
Now comes, months after the decision to scrap the land-based platform was made, US intelligence officials are worried about fresh allegations regarding the feasibility of the Islamic Republic of Iran fielding a first generation indigenous ‘Limited Range’ Inter Continental Ballistic Missile (ICBM) capable of hitting Continental America by the winter of 2014. That’s almost at the same time many experts believe Iran would have the ability to deploy a rudimentary nuclear warhead.
As present time Iran is capable of deploying several semi-advance mid-range missiles at the same time. Chief among them is the Shahab-3 or Shooting Star. The S-3 projects an operational range between 800 (1998 version) and 1,000 (with 2003 upgrade package) nautical miles. A Shahab-4, powered by a Russian RD-214 engine (same power plant use on the SS-4 system), is capable of en even greater range and carry a more accurate navigational package.
Against these threats, the Administration has conceived a simple rudimentary defense mechanism. In order to protect Europe, the Pentagon has suggested is the deployment of a limited number of Aegis-equipped (there are 63 total units in the US Navy inventory) ships with the new and improve SM-3 Block 1b. This platform was intended to protect a tactical environment. To defend the homeland, the DOD will relays on the already operational second generation Ground Based Interceptors (GBI).
There are a total of 30 GBI deployed in Continental US. Twenty six (26) of them deployed at Fort Greely, Alaska. With four additional units located at Vandenberg Air Force Base in California. As configured, the system will most likely defend the US homeland of a relative small, up to 16; inbound ICBMs utilizing the standard firing procedure of Shoot-Look-Shoot Again.
There’s a problem. Because of the location of the interceptors, the Southeast coast would require a different firing pattern that could consume up to four interceptors for missile in a Shoot-Shoot-Shoot-Shoot doctrine. This means that the US will exhaust its missile allocations in a limited strike.
This is the system the Obama Administration has placed all their cards in. It had decided not to field the full complement of interceptors allocated in the 2008 DOD Feasibility Study. It had canceled two of the much anticipated programs ever developed: the Airborne Laser and the Kinetic Energy Interceptor. To further the slide of the missile defense umbrella, the US has now ‘un-officially’ abandoned Europe in terms of a realistic missile shield. In fact, the new US plan does not field any operational unit on a regular basis before the year 2010. Even then, the ability to defend the ‘Old Continent’ depends on the successful conclusion to the SM-3, Block 2b program as well as the deployment of the Aegis radar, command and control system on Europe’s littoral waters.
More trouble for Europe. Because Obama’s new re-approchement policy towards Russia, he has signaled the wiliness of the US to forestall any new deployment of interceptors. Plans are still in the works for the fielding of 8 additional GBIs and for the development and testing of faster, two-stage interceptors originally slated to be fielded during the Missile Defense System’s Third Stage. All in the hopes of hammering out further concessions from a buoying Red Bear.
With Teheran in an accelerated pace to acquire nuclear weapon capabilities and its desire to field an ICBM-type platform by the second half of the decade, the pressure is on the US to reaffirm to nervous allies in Europe and the Middle East, that they will be protected by America’s military power. A power that had been eroded by the curtail on missile defense investment. @
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