Splash Two More SRBMs
The Missile Defense Agency is at it again, launching ballistic missiles near Hawaii to mimic an attack by an adversary and then blowing them out of the sky.
WASHINGTON — The Pentagon said Wednesday it intercepted two ballistic missiles in a successful test of its Terminal High Altitude Area Defense (THAAD) weapon system.
It was the first operational test of the system aimed at intercepting missiles at high altitude in the final stage of their trajectory, officials said.
Not the first test (actually the 12th THAAD test since 2005), but the first operational test, meaning soldiers were in control of the interceptor system instead of engineers.
You often hear claims that these tests are too "scripted", but as MDA moves its systems from the development stage to operational status, that criticism rings hollow.
[In order] to make this a realistic tactical environment, the soldiers did not know what day or time the mission would occur.
So the soldiers must have been sitting on station in an alert status for a period of days, watching the skies and waiting for threats to emerge from the clutter of commercial and military air traffic, simulating the uncertainty of armed conflict.
Defense Update reports that it was an "almost simultaneous kill" of the two targets. That makes nine in a row for THAAD.
Here's the official press release.
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Dec '10
Re: Splash Two More SRBMs
I'm curious if they are intercepting during the boost phase or post-boost phase of flight.
May '10
Re: Splash Two More SRBMs
Very cool, Mark.
Q: How advanced do you suppose this system (or a similar one) would be today if we'd been pursuing it with "moonshot" urgency for the last twenty five years?
Any thoughts?
May '10
Re: Splash Two More SRBMs
Post boost. Terminal phase, in fact; that's what the T stands for in THAAD. They intercept in the final 1/3 or so of the adversary warhead's flight.
Boost phase intercept is an entirely different animal, and I'm not sure we're going to make much progress on that any time soon.
May '10
Re: Splash Two More SRBMs
Scott, I gave your question some thought. I am so young in the timeline of this technology--I was born the month after President Reagan announced the SDI--it limits my perspective on its historical development. But here's how I see it.
With a stronger commitment to developing missile defense, some of the big milestones might have been achieved earlier, like the first intercept of what they call "cooperative" targets (with homing beacons or exceptionally large radar signatures), or the scaling down in size.
But today, two of the primary technical challenges are sensing and discrimination.
Sensing is simply the challenge of using radar or some other device to detect a relatively tiny incoming missile from thousands of miles away.
Discrimination is the art of figuring out which radar echoes in that cloud of debris heading toward you are the warhead(s) and which are junk, or even more difficult, decoys.
These two functions require enormous amounts of memory, processing power, and data fusion from multiple sources, which requires high transfer rates over long (transcontinental and transoceanic) distances. I have trouble imagining how the meteoric development of microprocessors and broadband could have been accelerated more than they already were.
Dec '10
Re: Splash Two More SRBMs
Awesome. I have no clue at all how this system is controversial in this country. Its an alternative to the "mutually assured destruction" doctrine. Whats not to like?
May '10
Re: Splash Two More SRBMs
Thanks, Mark. (And holy cow you're young. And I'm old. Dang.)
Dec '10
Re: Splash Two More SRBMs
Mark Wilson
Post boost. Terminal phase, in fact; that's what the T stands for in THAAD. They intercept in the final 1/3 or so of the adversary warhead's flight.
Boost phase intercept is an entirely different animal, and I'm not sure we're going to make much progress on that any time soon. · Oct 5 at 11:24pm
Having some understanding of how fast they come back into atmosphere I'm even more impressed. The problem with terminating in boost phase is the very short time during which to acquire, target, and terminate the missile. During post boost the problem is the math to intercept something that small going that fast. Huzzah to MDA. They are bullseyeing womp rats without the benefit of a T-16.
Dec '10
Re: Splash Two More SRBMs
Thanks Mark, very interesting. Reagan was ridiculed about his Star Wars vision, and now you guys are making it happen. This should be the top priority on any top priority list.
Apr '11
Re: Splash Two More SRBMs
I've heard this described as "Deflecting a bullet by firing another bullet at it."
That we've managed to succeed at all is impressive, that we do it as often as we do is downright amazing.
Aug '10
Re: Splash Two More SRBMs
I really don't know much about this, but I thought boost phase acquisition was supposed to be easier, as at that point the missile is bright and hot. In terminal phase it is cold and dark. That they succeed in acquisition in terminal phases is impressive indeed.
Mar '11
Re: Splash Two More SRBMs
Mark Wilson:
These two functions require enormous amounts of memory, processing power, and data fusion from multiple sources, which requires high transfer rates over long (transcontinental and transoceanic) distances. I have trouble imagining how the meteoric development of microprocessors and broadband could have been accelerated more than they already were. · Oct 6 at 1:54am
And that sums up why this would have been impossible on a broad operational basis when Reagan first pitched it, and why is was not an impossible deal by the late 90's. However it requires either serious and long National commitment or unfettered markets in a strong economy to relentless push the technology. How to do it in the1980's was understood, the means need time to gestate.
Dec '10
Re: Splash Two More SRBMs
When I worked at Lockheed Missiles and Space in 1980, they were working on HOE (High-Altitude Overlay Experiment), a missile interception project. Their kinetic kill payload was a fan about 10 meters across, with thin curved blades that had metal blocks at the tips. The blades were wrapped tight around the core for launch, and in the moments before closing in on the target, the warhead fairing was jettisoned to let the blades unfurl and start the warhead spinning. Coming anywhere within a 10-meter radius of the target warhead, the blades and the metal blocks would entangle and pummel the target and disrupt its trajectory (and hopefully make its reentry to the atmosphere fail catastrophically).
Nice to see that technology has progressed so well in the last three decades.
Aug '10
Re: Splash Two More SRBMs
Yes, it is awesome. But everyone is forgetting how effective pre-emptive strikes can be. Something along the lines of : "nice centrifuges you have there Ayatollah, pity if something would happen to them....".
Dec '10
Re: Splash Two More SRBMs
The problem is that at boost phase, the missile is far, far away, either in enemy territory or somewhere in the middle of the ocean (having just been launched by a submarine). It's therefore a lot harder to have eyes on all the potential launch sites and assets at the ready to shoot down anything originating from anywhere in that potential launch area.
By contrast, if you know what you're defending, you can localize your sensors and counter-weapons to defend just those targets. The Phalanx defense system for Navy and Coast Guard vessels also "hits a bullet with a bullet" - it just uses a whole lot of outgoing bullets to make the air in the path of the incoming missile very, very dense and inhospitable to missile flight.
May '10
Re: Splash Two More SRBMs
Boost phase eliminates the challenges in sensing and discrimination--the enemy missile will be as big as it's every going to be, relatively nearby, and very bright.
However, the new difficulty is having an interceptor with enough performance so you can launch it 1-2 minutes after you detect the threat, and it can catch up to the threat missile while it's accelerating upward (a good amount of the first minute or so of flight is close to vertical), covering the horizontal and vertical separation, and collide with it at high enough speed to destroy it.
That requires you to have missile defense assets relatively near the enemy launch site (I'm guessing tens or the low hundreds of miles), which is hard to achieve in a wartime situation.
Jun '10
Re: Splash Two More SRBMs
Now, we come to the political part of the question. It was controversial in this country for the simple fact that we have (effectively) enemies in our midst who are in the media and in government who sided with the Soviets in their fear and disdain for this technological competition. They lobbied the Soviet talking points at every major juncture. Simple as that.
These enemies within became our enemies by first absorbing and believing the notion that we were morally equivalent to the Soviets. Then, after swallowing that they became easy prey for the Commie-funded organizations to pass on Soviet propaganda directly into our media mainstream. We were deeply penetrated.
Similar things are going on right now with the Islamists.
Re: Splash Two More SRBMs
How much would you charge, Mark, for the right to aim one or two of those missiles at targets here on earth?
Edited on Oct 6, 2011 at 2:28pmAug '11
Re: Splash Two More SRBMs
Peter Robinson: How much would you charge, Mark, for the right to aim one or two of those missiles at targets here on earth? · Oct 6 at 2:28pm
Edited on Oct 06 at 02:28 pm
Mother-in-law threatening to move in again?
Mar '11
Re: Splash Two More SRBMs
Sorry Mark. It's just not feasible.
The Union of Concerned Scientists told us all in 1983 that you couldn't possibly ever hit a missile with a missile. Then in 2000, they told us that any country that could launch a missile that could hit us could also deploy defenses against missiles hitting their missiles.
(I'm not really sure why other countries would develop defenses against us doing something that just isn't ever going to be possible. I sent a letter to the UCS asking about that in 2000, but I haven't received a response yet. It's probably in the mail, though.)
May '10
Re: Splash Two More SRBMs
Peter, you don't want to pay my prices. There are cheaper alternatives.
And for Stuart who mentioned the Phalanx, here it is. And it's also being used for anti-mortar defense in Iraq by American and British forces. Click the link, the video is really cool.
Edited on Oct 6, 2011 at 6:28pm