Ballistic Missile Defense?

In 1995, Norway launched a previously announced research rocket that was reported to be intercepted and destroyed by the Russian Air Defense Command. The missile never got within 185 miles of Russia, but the erroneous Interfax report did occur. This incident clearly highlights the uncertainty of a world populated by a multitude of actors with ballistic missile capabilities. The proliferation of ballistic missiles, and the potential to marry them with weapons of mass destruction, compels the United States to evaluate their impact on U.S. security interests throughout the world. First, one must examine the systems that pose a potential threat to the United States. One also must make some predictions about when and where the next war will begin, how it will begin, and what kind of war it will be. Most important is the need to create an appropriate response to the threat. This paper addresses the critical characteristics of a ballistic missile defense system designed to meet the needs of the United States. The military response to ballistic missiles needs to be a well-rounded Theater Ballistic Missile Defense (TBMD) system. Such a system requires four major attributes. It must be layered to achieve a high probability of successfully stopping an incoming missile and to optimize the system for defense against salvos of ballistic missiles. It should focus on stopping the missile before launch or while it still remains over enemy territory (boost-phase oriented). It must be able to arrive in time to defend, and thus be rapidly deployable. And finally, the system must be integrated and networked together to ensure optimal use of the assets available and cooperative engagement of inbound threats. The appendixes contain tables of the types of ballistic missiles in the arsenals of developing countries and the missiles used in past regional conflicts, and figures showing the growing TBM threat in terms of missile types and ranges and OCA effects on TBM launches.