GlobalSecurity.org In the News

CNN: ANDERSON COOPER 360 DEGREES July 5, 2006

North Korea Missiles

(...)

COOPER: Well, the missile shots yesterday were tracked by satellite and ship-borne radar in the Pacific, as well as the country's new and yet untried antimissile system. Untried, not however, untested. CNN's Barbara Starr.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

BARBARA STARR, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): There have been 10 tests of the U.S. Interceptor. Only half have worked.

JOHN PIKE, GLOBALSECURITY.ORG: If the missile defense system was a baseball player, and had a batting average of 500, you would say it was doing pretty good. If it's only working half of the time and it's the only thing standing between you and an incoming hydrogen bomb, you would say it's not working very well at all.

STARR: The five tests that failed, one as recently as last February, had various technical problems. Pentagon officials say those have been solved. And they are now confident the missiles would work during an attack, mainly because there were four consecutive successful hits against target missiles in 2001 and 2002. But that was four years ago. Since then, much of the technology has been upgraded.

But one defense official familiar with the program acknowledges the major criticism. That the testing done so far is not realistic.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: All systems are go for launch. Standby for terminal count.

STARR: That it's all been scripted out ahead of time, as most weapons tests are.

Analysts say the U.S. may still have problems shooting down anything more complex than a single warhead. The biggest risk still may be the continuing uncertainty about North Korea's real intentions.

PIKE: And it's possible that one day they'll provoke a crisis, get in over their head and suddenly we'll find ourselves in a shooting war with them. Under those circumstances, you might hope that you had a reliable missile defense because they might not prove completely deterrable.

STARR (on camera): Deterrable or not, the basic problem remains, after years of development and billions of dollars spent, knowing how well missile defense may work may be just as tough as knowing whether it will be needed.

Barbara Starr, CNN, the Pentagon.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

(...)