U.S. gives up on upgrading missile defense

UPI
Oct. 14, 2005

WASHINGTON -- Lawmakers say the Bush administration has decided to abandon efforts to improve its current system of ground-based ballistic missile interceptors.

"After many years of investment in this midcourse interceptor, (the Pentagon's Missile Defense Agency) has now essentially decided that the first generation (ground-based interceptors) will also be its last generation," said the Senate Committee on Appropriations in a report accompanying its version of the 2006 defense appropriations bill.

The U.S. Missile Defense Agency continues to seek billions to develop and deploy the interceptors, including up to 40 in Alaska by the end of 2007 and some in Europe after that, but the committee said it had abandoned plans for further improvements to the interceptor currently being deployed -- a process known as "spiral development" in which systems are deployed before they are fully developed and then upgraded as technology improves.

The committee also said the agency was seeking to separate the interceptor from other parts of the midcourse intercept program, including its advanced radar and command and control systems, according to National Journal's Global Security Newswire.

The report, published last week, said the decision would risk wasting much of the time and money already invested.

"This approach would fail to capitalize on the years of previous investment and technology development in a decreasing budgetary environment," it said.

A spokesman for the Missile Defense Agency told Global Security Newswire it would not comment on the report until after the appropriations bill is finalized later this fall.