Kyle Mizokami
For nearly forty years, one air-defense system has protected the airspace above U.S. forces. Continuously upgraded since introduction, today the Patriot missile system protects against the full spectrum of flying threats, from ballistic missiles to consumer-grade quadcopter drones.
The design of Patriot goes back as far as 1965, when then secretary of defense Robert McNamara authorized development of a new air-defense missile, SAM-D. SAM-D was set to replace the Nike Hercules surface-to-air missile systems and protect against medium- to high-altitude threats. Patriot was intended to be a new-generation system that would incorporate new technologies, including computer control, multiple target engagement, and the ability to operate in an electronic-countermeasures-heavy environment.As ambitious as SAM-D was, it had a lengthy development cycle. In 1973 it was nearly terminated by Secretary of Defense James Schlesinger, who, among other things, believed that a long-range surface-to-air missile was an Air Force responsibility and that the system was overly complicated. By 1975, it had proved its ability to shoot down targets, and around then was renamed MIM-104 Patriot. Patriot stands for Phased Array Tracking Intercept of Target, although it’s unclear what came first—the name or the acronym. Patriot entered low-rate production in 1980, with the missile first fielded in 1985.
http://nationalinterest.org/blog/the-buzz/why-americas-enemies-fear-the-patriot-missile-defense-system-19833
