Boeing Proposes Politics-Dodging Missile Defense System

Stationing U.S. missile defense assets in Europe has always been a tough sell: The Russians resolutely oppose it, and domestic political opposition in both Poland and the Czech Republic — where interceptors and an X-Band radar would be based — slowed negotiations. And with George W. Bush out of office, European-based missile defense lost its most staunch advocate.
Now Boeing, maker of the Ground-Based Interceptors (GBI) that are currently stationed in Alaska and California, has forwarded a more marketable version of the system: Instead of parking them in permanent silos, they are proposing to package the interceptors in a truck container. Amy Butler of Aviation Week & Space Technology has the details:

The missile would be hatched and perched on a pedestal in preparation for launch. Including shipping from the continental United States, the mobile GBI could be ready for launch 24 hours after departure, says Norm Tew, Boeing GMD program manager.

This configuration could address some of Russia’s concerns about a fixed site of Polish silos. And, it could be subject to standard arms control monitoring regimes. Perhaps to quell Russian worries, it could be stored in containers until a threat is detected, whereupon the system could be readied for launch in about an hour.

Forget for a minute about the test record of the GBI system, which has been mixed. Developing a mobile system would potentially be cheaper — and less politically charged — than a fixed-site system. Another selling point? If the former head of Israel’s missile defense program is correct, Iran could have a ballistic missile with a range sufficient to reach London within three or four years.

Of course, if you are interested in mobile missile defense, there’s always the sea-based option: As our own David Axe has pointed out, the Navy’s Standard Missile-3 (pictured here), which is installed on Aegis ships, has the best test record of any U.S. missile defense system; in a recent issue of Proceedings, a retired naval officer called for shifting more resources to sea-based defenses.


Riki Ellison, the head of the Missile Defense Advocacy Alliance, just returned from the big missile-defense shindig in Huntsville, Alabama, and he said that a consensus was building around a land-based version of the SM-3 instead of a fixed site in Europe.

“The preferred solution which was referenced in many of the discussions as well as presented by Lt. Gen. Patrick O’Reilly, Director of the Missile Defense Agency, is the concept of land-basing the SM3 and Aegis sea-based missile defense system and integrating it with current missile defense sensors and with new sensors such as remote UAVs [unmanned aerial vehicles], and space-based sensors such as the STSS (Space Tracking Surveillance System),” Ellison told Danger Room. ” … The system would first be placed in Israel and additional land-based SM3’s will likely be placed in Turkey or the Balkan nations if an international agreement could be attained. The placement in Turkey and the Balkans could potentially have the ability to protect the U.S. homeland on early assent intercepts of ballistic missiles from Iran.”
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