America's Missile Defense Systems: The Ultimate Paper Tiger?
Sebastien Roblin
February 11, 2018
On the morning of January 31, 2018, an Aegis Ashore missile battery based in Kauai, Hawaii cued onto an approaching intermediate-range ballistic missile (IRBM). The installation launched an SM-3 Block IIA missile to intercept the IRBM at speeds over fifteen times the speed of sound.
The Standard Missile 3 Block IIA was devised to allow U.S. Navy destroyers and cruisers to shoot down short- to intermediate-range ballistic missiles at ranges of up to 1,350 miles while they are soaring above the Earth’s atmosphere in their midcourse phase. According to the Missile Defense Agency, this marked the first occasion in which the missile was launched from a land-based Aegis Ashore battery, and the first time it used both space- and land-based sensors to cue the intercept.
http://nationalinterest.org/blog/the-buzz/americas-missile-defense-systems-the-ultimate-paper-tiger-24436
