Closing Velocity

Juniper Cobra 2009 Underway: US & Israel Conduct Massive Missile Defense Drills

Aegis BMD Destroyer USS Decatur (DDG-73) at Haifa, Israel

Delayed a week, Juniper Cobra 10 is now in full swing in Israel:

TEL AVIV — A massive air defence drill under way in Israel will join Israeli and US systems to create the world's most advanced anti-missile umbrella to protect the Jewish state, officials said on Thursday.

The Juniper Cobra 10 exercises, the fifth in a series of joint air defence drills between the allies, began this week and comes amid heightened tension between Israel and arch-foe Iran.

Some 1,000 US soldiers will take part in the two-week exercise combining Israeli and US systems to "create the world's most advanced air defence system to protect our citizens and homes from attack," the commander of Israel's Air Defence Corps, Brigadier General Doron Gavish, told reporters.

Unlike past Juniper Cobras, this one will employ the widest spectrum of missile defense assets yet, including the US's Aegis BMD ships, Patriot PAC-3 batteries, THAAD batteries, the mobile X-Band radar currently stationed in the Negev, and Israel's own Arrow 2 batteries. Interoperability between allied systems is the main goal.

While planned well over two years ago, this iteration of Juniper Cobra is seen as an early indicator of how Obama's new European missile defense plan will take shape:

In this series of exercises we continue to advance our understanding of the art and the science of ballistic ."missile defense," Rear Admiral John Richardson, the U.S. officer overseeing Juniper Cobra, told reporters in Tel Aviv.

"This exercise is not directly related to recent announcements about ballistic missile defense in Europe, but the lessons and the insights that we gain from this exercise will certainly relate to developing that capability."

Admiral Richardson also goes on the dispel the scuttlebutt of the US leaving its missile defense hardware behind in Israel after Juniper Cobra is finished:

None of the American materiel used in the drill will remain in Israel after it winds up in mid-November, they said. But the United States does have a small military garrison at a strategic radar, X-band, stationed in Israel's southern Negev desert.

"The Israel Defense Force can defend Israel alone," Gavish said. "But it is good to know that U.S. capabilities are available."

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Israeli Arrow II Not Launched In Latest Intercept Test Off CA

Details are sketchy right now, but it appears we have a "D'Oh!"on this joint Israeli-US test:

In a test involving three U.S. missile interceptors, Arrow tracked a target missile dropped from a C-17 aircraft, the Pentagon said in a statement. The Israeli system also exchanged data on the target in real-time with elements of the U.S. missile defense system, the statement said.

"Not all test conditions to launch the Arrow Interceptor were met and it was not launched," the Pentagon said.

The US interceptors "invovled" were a Patriot PAC-3, a THAAD, and the USS Benfold, an Aegis BMD destroyer. It appears that the Israeli Arrow II was the planned shooter and all the other assets were on station to exchange sensor and tracking data, which MDA claims met their objectives, including a simulated intercept by Benfold (PDF of MDA's release here).

Interoperability between our allied systems is very important, so it's not a total wash. I would like to know why the Arrow II stayed in its launcher, though.

Japanese Govt. Authorizes Military To Intercept NK Missile/Debris

Left: Japanese Aegis ships Kongo and Chokai; Right: Japanese PAC-3 Battery

It's official: the constitutionally pacifist Japanese government has finished the arduous legal process of allowing its military to act against the North Korean threat:

Japan ordered its military on Friday to destroy a North Korean missile or its debris, if the launch fails and falling pieces of the rocket seem to imperil Japanese territory.

Japan ordered two destroyers equipped with American-built Aegis anti-missile systems into the Sea of Japan, and said it would soon move Patriot land-to-air missiles to the country's northern coast, over which the North Korean rocket is likely to fly.

Ted Postol, permanent fixture and tiresome folk hero of the BMD skeptic crowd, weighs in predictably:

"They are not up to the job," said Theodore Postol, an expert on missile systems and a professor of science, technology and national security policy at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

Like the US, Japan has been methodically testing its ballistic missile defense systems (BMDS) ever since North Korea started aggressively overflying the island nation with its WMD carriers:

• JS Kongo intercepts ballistic missile with SM-3 (video), the first successful test of Aegis BMD by a US ally (Dec. 2007)

• Japanese PAC-3 crew successfully intercepts a target missile at White Sands, NM, another first for a US ally (Sept. 2008)

• JS Chokai fails to intercept. While all the elements of the Aegis BMD performed as expected (radar, fire control, launch, etc.), the SM-3 interceptor failed in the final seconds before intercept (Nov. 2008).

So, a mixed bag, but I wouldn't say "they're not up to the job."

Silly Arabs Buy $3.3 Billion Worth Of "Unproven" Missile Defense

Earlier this year, the United Arab Emirates ordered over $7 billion worth of THAAD, and today the UAE adds to their missile defense with over $3 billion worth of Patriot:

Defense contractor Raytheon Co. said Thursday that the United Arab Emirates has ordered a Patriot missile defense system worth $3.3 billion.

The order, which came through the Defense Department, is for batteries used to shoot down incoming missiles in their last stages of flight. The system includes power generators, radar, and interceptor missiles made by Raytheon and Lockheed Martin Corp.

It is the latest purchase of missile defense equipment by U.S. allies in the Middle East. Saudi Arabia, Israel and Kuwait have all bought Patriot and other missile shield systems, largely to protect against missile threats from nations such as Iran.

Missile threats from where? I-what?

UPDATE: NPR has a report on this UAE deal (audio here), including input from Sec. Gates and Gen. Petraeus on the need for missile defense in the Middle East.

Missile Defense: Good News, Bad News

Good News: Just days after North Korea tested a new longer range ICBM engine, Japan had a successful missile intercept in a test of the US-developed PAC-3 Patriot system:

The Japanese air force shot down the dummy missile using Patriot Advanced Capability-3 (PAC-3) interceptors in a ground-to-air test at White Sands, New Mexico, on Wednesday, the Defense Ministry said in a statement.

Bad News: The US scrubbed its own THAAD missile intercept test after the target (not the interceptors) malfunctioned:

It was the first breakdown after five successful tests of the Terminal High Altitude Area Defense system, or THAAD. Four of the successful test had been conducted with launches from the Pacific Missile Range at Barking Sands and one from White Sands, New Mexico.

The Missile Defense Agency said that because of the failure, the two THAAD interceptor missiles that were to take part in the test were not launched. So the full test was never completed.

...

"Because of the target malfunction, the target did not have enough momentum to reach the open ocean area previously approved for safe intercept," she said, adding that the target missile fell into the sea within the safe area.

Oh well, at least we didn't waste a couple of expensive birds...

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(Originally posted at Perfunction; original comment threads are over there)